[Alan McCoy]

Jim,

The idea I have for the class is basically to enhance communication between
pianists and technicians. So many pianists are clueless about their
instrument. I want to address that so that especially piano majors know what
is possible for a given piano and know how to ask for it. So my aim is not
to train someone to be a technician, but to teach about the piano from a
technical perspective. I will most likely approach this from a practical
point of view covering things like naming notes (D5 instead of "the D two
octaves above mid C), historical temperaments, naming piano parts, knowing
how actions work, pulling in a unison, answering the basic questions we all
hear (how often should I tune....etc) that sort of thing.

Alan

____________________________________________
Alan McCoy, RPT
EWU Piano Technician
509-359-7017
amccoy@mail.ewu.edu


> -----Original Message-----
> From: James A Busby [mailto:jab367@email.byu.edu]
> Sent: Tuesday, March 04, 2003 2:30 PM
> To: Alan McCoy
> Subject:
>
>
> Hi Alan,
> Here at BYU we have a "mentoring program" which basically
> apprentices from 2 - 6
> students. Currently we have 5. I don't know if you're interested
> in this but let
> me know if you are. We use to offer a larger program with formal
> classes, but
> have decided against it for $$ reasons, and due to the saturation
> of the local
> market with technicians.
>      I could give you some philosophies concerning scope and sequence of
> training, or why we don't teach tuning the 1st 3 months, etc. Most of our
> training is from materials available from various sources such as
> PTG , etc.
> (not Potter) We are in the proces of developing written
> materials, as well as
> digital videos.
>      Let me know if you if we're on the same page. Dallas would
> be a good place
> to talk.
>      BTW, there is $ available for "mentoring grants" from the fed.
>
> Jim Busby RPT
> Brigham Young University
>
>