Piano Technician Training

[Greg Casper]

Doug:

I ditto Clyde's comments. I also took the course and it got me started. But
to be honest, I learned substantially more by reading Arthur Reblitz book
"Piano Servicing, Tuning & Rebuilding. It has much more detailed information
and is far more comprehensive than the ASPT course.

Greg Casper
San Jose, CA

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-pianotech@ptg.org [mailto:owner-pianotech@ptg.org]On Behalf
Of Clyde Hollinger
Sent: Tuesday, July 16, 2002 6:19 PM
To: pianotech@ptg.org
Subject: Re: Piano Technician Training


Doug,

I took the course from American School of Piano Tuning about 25-30 years
ago.
Some years later a publication did an article on correspondence courses in
piano service.  If my memory serves me correctly,  this course ranked
poorly.
One thing positive I can say about it -- it got me started!  Most of my
learning came from PTG in one way or another.

Regards,
Clyde Hollinger, RPT

Doug Jones wrote:

> Greetings,
>         I just joined the mailing list a couple of days ago and have been
> enjoying the amount of email sent to me by this mailing list.  It's nice
> to see a very active list.
>
>         I do have a question about training to become a piano technician
> (as I'm sure you have been asked numerous times).  How did you get your
> training?  Currently, I'm looking into both the Randy Potter and the
> Americal School correspondence courses, but I'm not sure if either is
> better or if I should try to find a technician who is willing to take on
> an apprentice.
>
>         I have issues with how both schools present themselves as being
> the "better" school.  In the case of Randy Potter, he includes a
> 12-year-old article from Keyboard Magazine saying that his school is the
> best.  (Written by Larry Fine, no less)  I'm not sure how much relavance
> an article of that age has on training today.  In the case of the American
> School, there are email testimonials included, but none of the
> testimonials are from members of the PTG.  They say that they just haven't
> bothered.  Cost, of course, is an issue, since the Randy Potter course
> costs twice as much as the American School course.
>
>         Which brings me to the other option.  From what I've read on the
> list and the archives, it seems to me that most piano technicians would
> not be willing to take on an apprentice since they fear that this will
> take business away from them.  How can that be approached?  Yes, I'd be
> willing to pay a technician for training if they would offer it to me.
> I have been in touch with the PTG about membership and stating that I'm
> looking to maybe apprentice to someone.  I'm currently living in the SF
> Bay Area, just to give you a geographical reference.
>
> Any help/suggestions/comments would be very welcome.  You are welcome to
> contact me off-list if you feel that this is not worthy of the bandwidth
> on the list.
>
> Thank you very much.
> Sincerely,
> Doug Jones