S&S D and a fair assessment

[Ron Nossaman]

>-the whole section in general sounded bad. Would a broken wire in that 
>section affect that section affect the bridge that much? I haven't seen 
>that in the past. with other wire replacement on this instrument.

No, I wouldn't think so. A broken string will affect the tuning on either 
side of it for maybe three or four unisons, but I think that's the plate 
springing more than anything else. Replacing the string pulls the plate 
back about where it was and the neighboring unisons tend to come mostly 
back into tune, but still need touch up. The only lingering instability is 
what you normally get with a D when you make a minor pitch adjustment. They 
tend to be pretty squirrelly about pitch changes.

Is the piano barn sealed and climate controlled? Do you really know how 
long it was left out, either the day you replaced the string, the day you 
tuned it, or anywhere in between? Was it cooked under 50,000,000,000 
candlepower stage lighting for three hours anywhere in there?

>-The environment that the piano was in for approx. 4 hrs. was much harsher 
>than its use to, and this is my gut feeling as to why the piano was a tad 
>sick Friday night..or..

Yes, I think that's the majority of it - or maybe it's the casters.


>-is it possible that my pin-setting technique needs to be more critical(if 
>that's possible) with this section of the D(I haven't seen this problem in 
>the 5 years working with the instrument)..or..

Not unless you have suddenly gotten sloppy in that specific section of that 
specific piano, which isn't any more likely than tens of thousands of sets 
of hammers from a number of different manufacturers all exhibiting tonal 
deficiencies in the killer octave and low tenor in a number of different 
makes and models of piano for a whole lot of years. But it's possible.


>I'm scratching my head on this one, and if you have experience with the D 
>in a similar concert setting, I'd like to hear your gut feeling.

Have some ice cream. Take a nap. Find something else to worry about, 
because this will take care of itself with your usual good service. It's a 
blip.

Ron N