Backchecking Height and an incredible help

[antares@euronet.nl]

On woensdag, mei 28, 2003, at 08:21 Europe/Amsterdam, David Andersen 
wrote:

>
> COMMENTS BELOW......
>
>
> on 5/27/03 12:20 PM, antares@euronet.nl at antares@euronet.nl wrote:
>
>> A general rule : back checks should be positioned at an angle of 72
>> degrees...that's numero uno and VERY important.
>> secondly, a hammer tail should under no circumstances touch a back
>> check when the hammer is on its way to the string.
>> You can check this by laying your hand on the hammer, press the hammer
>> down a bit and depress the key, so that the hammer is forced up even
>> though the pressure of the hand presses it down (a bit). If the tail 
>> of
>> the hammer then touches the leather of the back check, you can feel it
>> and hear it.
>> The ideal position for a back check is such that the hammer checks as
>> high as possible WITHOUT touching the back check on its way UP.
>> The higher a hammer can check un-hindred, the less energy is wasted in
>> the play of repetition.
>> It may very well be possible that, when a pianist bangs on a key very
>> hard and fast, the hammer shank flexes somewhat so that the hammer 
>> head
>> gets sort of warped and thereby hits the back check nevertheless.
>> For that reason the distance between the hammer and the string is
>> generally somewhere between 14-15-16 mm, but is just a safety margin.
>>
>> Antares,
>> The Netherlands
>
> Excellent, concise, and informative, as always, my friend-----yet 
> there is
> one other, more "ethereal" consideration I have been working with and
> rediscovering over the years----that every action, when set up
> properly(which, I guess, is according to me), has a backchecking "sweet
> spot".....a place where the feeling of actually controlling the hammer 
> at
> the end of your fingers is subtly enhanced.  Not too low, not too 
> high.  The
> sound of the tail hitting the backcheck becomes softer, and there is a
> slight feeling of more weight initially when the action is played, but 
> it
> quickly becomes pleasurable--- you can feel more of the "teeter-totter"
> feeling that a component-balanced action(or a well-guessed-at one) can 
> give
> you.

Very good of you to make this comment about the 'feel' David. Indeed, 
we can adjust the height of the hammers checking by the sound they make 
in the back check and the more experienced we are, the more exact we 
are and the less time and energy we spend.

btw, maybe some of you don't know it, but at the Yamaha Academy and in 
the Yamaha factory almost every tech has an ebony tool in his/her 
pocket to adjust the height of the back checks.
When an action has been perfectly regulated and we perform a hammer 
drop, the distance between hammer tail and top of back check should be 
exactly 2mm. This seems to be a universal grand regulation measure but 
if we check on this very distance we may notice that it almost never is 
the case.
At one time (I'm sorry, I repeat myself here, but it is really a long 
time ago) my esteemed instructor Tsuji-san taught me to improve the 
volume of sound by adjusting the height of the CFIII-S back check to 
EXACTLY 2 mm. (it was much less because the back check was actually too 
high). Too my astonishment the sound suddenly was - significantly - 
louder.
I have since cherished and used this trick during many occasions where 
an instrument was too soft due to whatever caused it.
It is an incredible help for intoneurs too because it gives us an 
opportunity to improve and re-establish volume without fooling around 
with the hammer felt in what ever way.

The funniest thing is (I remember this now) that up to now, nobody in 
Japan nor on this list, was able to explain this phenomenon.
So let's give it a try again?

Antares,
The Netherlands

see my website at : www.concertpianoservice.nl