[pianotech] repeat business

Don pianotuna at accesscomm.ca
Thu Aug 19 17:09:18 MDT 2010


Hi,

Seasonal tunings? Well in New York the old literature from Steinway
suggested 1 tuning a month.

Perhaps it may be wise to recommend humidity control? (I bet this doesn't
surprise anyone who knows me).

It is rare for me to find an upright piano that can't be controlled to
within 2 cents per years, once the instrument has had enough tunings to
stabilize it.

The time to book the next tuning is before you walk out the door from the
first visit. That's when the client is the happiest.

At 11:13 AM 8/19/2010 -0700, you wrote:
>
>>I've been amazed at how sour tunings can go with a seasonal change, 
>>and how they can magically heal themselves when things return to 
>>time of tuning conditions.
>
>
>Hi, Ryan
>
>Ah, yes, the self-healing tuning. That has always been a favorite idea for
me.
>
>I do warn customers that if a piano which has sat in pretty good 
>shape for a long, long time suddenly goes way out of whack in a few 
>days, they should grit their teeth and wait about three weeks, 
>because often it will go right back in. On the other hand, if it goes 
>sour all at once like that, and they tune it then, give it about 
>three weeks and it'll probably go back out again, only in the other
direction.
>
>I try to spread the idea to customers that it's better to tune just 
>after a major change of season, instead of just before it. 
>Nonetheless, they are the ones who decide, and if in spite of being 
>warned that the time is not ideal, they want a tuning in August ... 
>they get a tuning in August. (Well, not THIS August, at least not by 
>me, but maybe next August.)
>
>If I come to tune a piano and it's almost perfect already, even if it 
>has been two or three years, I give it a touch up and the customer a 
>price break, and I suggest waiting till it bothers them to have it 
>done again. So many people feel that "regular maintenance" should be 
>determined not by how the piano sounds but by how much time has 
>elapsed. I try to convince them to use their ears instead. "I feel my 
>life is too short to spend it tuning pianos which are already in tune."
>
>Susan Kline
>
>>
>
>
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00:35:00
>
Regards,
Don Rose, B.Mus., A.M.U.S., A.MUS., R.P.T.
Non calor sed umor est qui nobis incommodat

mailto:pianotuna at yahoo.com	http://www.donrose.ca/

3004 Grant Rd. REGINA, SK, S4S 5G7
306-539-0716 


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