Hello Dale,
I realized just as I hit the send button that this post was poorly
expressed as regarding the voicing "up and down" in that it suggested
just what you have picked up on - that there are no methods for this,
when, in fact, there of course are many. I prefer, though, to work
with a hammer that does not need lacquer, except, perhaps in the very
top. Ronsen, Schaff, the late but, perhaps not to heavily lamented,
departed American, and, perhaps, Issaacs, provide such as far as I
know. This, as far as I can tell from observing thousands of older
pianos with original hammers, appears to have been the prevalent design
for the last hundred and thirty years or so in the United States. What
I was criticizing was the method used by a certain factory that relies
on lacquer to impart acceptable stiffness into the hammer which doesn't
have it otherwise, and turns this entire process into a art endorsed by
this factory. This, I think, would be totally unnecessary were that
hammer to have what, if memory serves, Dolge, or pehaps, it was
Wolfenden, referred to when they made the comment which I have read
somewhere; (paraphrasing if I may) "It is ever the art of the hammer
maker to provide a firm foundation under the striking point of the
hammer"
This factory's hammer, by design requires heavy lacquering and the
result is never acceptable, sufficiently stable, or consistent, in my
opinion. When, on occasion, the result does, as perhance happens, to
sound good, it will not stay that way without constant attention and,
even then, this is iffy soon as the weather changes or drying
proceeds. This, along with the entire inadequacy of its design, in my
opinion creates many problems which they could easily mitigate by
returning to the kind of hammer they used prior to WWII or so, along
with better placement of the knuckle and other things done to reduce
friction in the action. Nevertheless, we all have to accomodate this
particularly methodology even though one may disagree with it.
If I could have an ideal hammer it would have this "firm
foundation", first and foremost, be proportionally not very large, have
a walnut or mahogany molding, be properly stapled (some are faked out),
be reinforced, be stiffened on the shoulder with a stiffening solution,
and have a relatively small molding. The shape of the point is, I
think, not absolutely critical, except it has to be taken into account
when the compression in the hammer is evaluated after pressing. In my
highly uninformed opinion the absolute quality of the felt is probably
not decisive as long as certain minimal parameters are met but I don't
know what these are. The pressing, though, is absolutely critical. in
my view, as the stress distribution in the hammer is controlled by this
and must absolutely be under analysis and subject to the intent of the
manufacturer.
It is evident to me that the American piano industry routinely
produced, apparently without much difficulty, or correlating it much
with expense, hammer sets similar or varying slightly in detail here
and there to this description for nearly a century. One finds such
hammers, in good or poor condition, on all kinds of pianos, from the
cheapest to the most expensive, all around, which, with work, can be
made to sound quite nice. Steinway hammers, as I said in an earlier
post, were one of the lightest and smallest around, those of Sohmer,
perhaps one of the heaviest. Most of the higher quality American
companies (Steinway, Chickering, Baldwin, Mason & Hamlin, to a lesser
degree Knabe and others), tended to the lighter, smaller end of this
spectrum. I say, emphatically, there are valid reasons for these
attributes, both as regards touch and sound.
It is interesting to note that Steinway in Europe has long used a
heavy, harder kind of hammer unlike that used in North America. I would
suggest this exemplies the differences in the market in Europe and the
US. In Europe a heavier, bigger hammer, in my experience, has been the
norm, except, in particular, on some English pianos, and it seems that
the European industry never evolved to that level of design which was
reached in North America, nor, understood the possiblities. The
differences in approach represented by Steinway in Europe and the US
typify this.
If you can get such a hammer, which are available more or less,
from Ronsen, Schaff, of late American, perhaps Issaacs, and others I
don't know of, then I believe tonebuilding should proceed in the ways I
mentioned in the other post, that is to build "up" the sound to a level
that will allow for it to be taken down slightly by needleing Needling
then takes it "down".
So far as voicing to taste for a particular musician, all bets are
off - lacquer and imbibable alcohol are, one could say, of equal
utility. I try to avoid these situations and, usually, consider the
psychology of the musician as much of a challenge as is the sound.
Even if the hammer is not installed to overcenter, in my opinion,
most boards can be made to respond adequately with the normal, ordinary
techniques of tonebuilding. However, one thing frequently overlooked,
is the improvement made in sound by slight burning of the shank. Even
though one should try to keep this to minimum for the sake of the
strength of the shanks, it is impossible to install any set of hammers
optimally, in my opinion, that is, so that they produce the best
acoustic output from the string. With or without a jig and even though
extreme care be followed it is unavoidably necessary, in virtually
every installation, to spend considerable time buring the shanks in
order to align the elastic axis of the hammer assembly, that is the
shank, flange, pin, and hammer, to the strings when using the kind of
light, resilient hammer which, in my opinion works best on all
pianos.
The elastic axis of the hammer assembly is not the same from hammer
to hammer and cannot be due to several considerations. Many are
familiar, already with the requirement to lean the inclined hammers a
little to the left in the bass, and to the right in the tenor. These
inclinations offset the moment generated in the hammer by assymetry and
facilitate its striking the string optimally. It is necessary in
hammers inclined to the right, to lean to the left, as the section of
the hammer to the right of the center of the shank is larger that the
section to the left which results in the hammer rotating somewhat to the
right when the shank is driven. Similarly, for those inclined to the
left. But, other complications also exist. One of these is the taper
from treble to bass of the set itself. Every straight hammer, is heavier
to the left of its midline than to the right. This is a complication of
the inclined hammers to. These things, require, in my mind, that all
hammers be examined after installation and burned when such will improve
the sound which is very very frequently the case and, especially so, in
the treble. Even though one very frequently hears commentary made that
the installation should be square to the shank, if that is the design
intention, this is, almost always susceptible of improvement and, in
light hammers, especially critical.
Part of the reason, as far as I can see, for the proliferation of
the big, heavy, hard hammer and large shank is an attempt by the
manufacturers to avoid the substantial time required for these kinds of
tonebuilding techniques in an attempt to lessen costs. The end result
is a lessened product to my ear.
Regards, Robin Hufford
around Erwinspiano@aol.com wrote:
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