Hearing Loss does it really happen?

[Frank Emerson]

When I was a university staff tech, I had an assistant who had been trained as a tuner in the Baldwin factory, when it was still in Cincinnati.  He had worked for many years as a tuner in the factory.  As a university tech, he did excellent work for many years.  A few years before he retired I began to get complains about his tuning of the harpsichords.  His tunings on pianos and harpsichords had always be outstanding.  I followed up on one of his harpsichord tunings and found that everything was perfect, except the top two or three notes, and they weren't even close.  His piano tuning continued to be as fine as ever, so I took over the harpsichord tuning for that point on.  The high frequency hearing loose seemed to come quite suddenly, in this case.

Many years later, I had a customer complain that the top few notes sounded "dead" in her Steinway B.  It was a fine piano, and she was an outstanding player, in her day.  She was rather aged, and recently moved into a nursing home.  The management of the home allowed her to have her piano moved into a chapel on the premise so she could continue to play her piano.  The piano sounded fine, and I could find no fault with the top few notes..  I also tuned her daughter's piano, and was scheduled to tune the daughter's piano later that week.  I told her daughter about it, and suggested that it might be high frequency hearing loose.  The daughter told me that the mother had hearing aids, and she would bring it to the attention of her audiologist at the next check up.  The daughter called me a few weeks later to tell me that the audiologist tweaked her hearing aids, and it was a huge break through for her mom.  Not only could she hear the highest notes on her piano again, but she could understand conversation better.  I had detected something that her audiologist had overlooked for years.  I probably would not have suspected the hearing loose, if it had not been for my earlier experience at the university.

Frank Emerson
pianoguru at earthlink.net


----- Original Message ----- 
From: 
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Sent: 1/23/2007 2:41:49 PM 
Subject: Hearing Loss does it really happen?


Greetings,

      I would like to hear from some seasoned tuners. Has anyone out there had any hearing loss? Should I protect my ears?   I know that I used to play the notes alot more loud  as a novice , than I do now days (except when I have to give the key a smart blow in order to set the string) That cant be helped (unless you want to sell the client a tuning that wont last as long)

AnY advice? COmmernts?


Thanks 
JUlia Gottshall 
Reading, PA
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