[CAUT] Agraffes and dampers

[Alan McCoy]

Joe,

Go to your library and get a copy of "The Well-Prepared Piano" by Richard
Bunger. Colorado College Music Press. Colorado Springs. 1973. This is a
definitive text. I have made a couple copies of this text and loan it and
the Eder video out to interested pianists and composers here. These are
mandatory for consultation for anyone here wanting to experiment. Part of
our policies on piano use.

I'll echo the comments of other regarding Alan Eder's video. Well done.

I'll also echo the others who have suggested some openness regarding the
music created with prepared pianos. Can be a very interesting and exciting
musical experience.

Regarding the string breakage, breakage at the agraffe is frequently a
result of string fatigue resulting from lots of hard playing. But you might
take some scale measurements and look at tension and break % though just for
your knowledge base. On some pianos BP can get high at the top end, but
still shouldn't be much higher than 60%. There are several string scaling
spreadsheets floating around that make it easier to begin getting a grip on
scale analysis. Could it be a batch of bad strings? Have you replaced the
strings repeatedly or just once? When replacing the strings, have you miked
the strings, or just gone with the wire gauge decal on the bridge or plate?
German, Asian and American wire gauges are slightly different.

Alan

-- Alan McCoy, RPT
Eastern Washington University
amccoy at mail.ewu.edu
509-359-4627


> From: Joe Wiencek <jwpiano at earthlink.net>
> Reply-To: "College and University Technicians <caut at ptg.org>" <caut at ptg.org>
> Date: Tue, 15 May 2007 08:55:12 -0400
> To: <caut at ptg.org>
> Subject: [CAUT] Agraffes and dampers
> 
> Hello list,
> This is my first posting to the CAUT list.  I have two questions
> 1:  How do you keep dampers free from damage when modern music requires
> playing the strings with fingers and the performers paste the damper
> heads with colored stickers, then remove them and tearing felt, etc.
> This is at NYU, but my own experience in music school tells me it must
> be all over.
> 
> 2:  A  Petrof P131 upright with agraffes to the top has broken every
> string from E6-E7.  The break is at the edge of the bearing before
> entering the agraffe on the speaking side. Any ideas?
> Thanks,
> 
> Joe Wiencek
> jwpiano at earthlink.net
> 
> tel: 551 358 4006
>