[CAUT] tone building for impatient pianists

[Richard Brekne]

Hi Kent

"Fatness" in my tonal vocabulary is tied up with the deeper parts of the 
hammer. As I said... the surface of a hammer can give beautiful 
pianissimo if its voiced nicely while at the same time a fortissimo or 
harder blow will not sound nice at all... it can outright quack at you 
if you get my meaning.

Fatness is body.... roundness beyond that which is obtained by using 
only a soft blow with hammers that are not glassy hard through and 
through even to their surface.  I suppose ideally, the ideal voice for 
any give hammer is one that is as fat as you can get it without 
sacrificing that glassy ice hard brightness when you want it.  Beyond 
what is possible... one would want both fatness and glassy brightness at 
all levels (volume-wise) of play whenever one desired either.... yes ? 
But you know this already Kent. Perhaps my wording is just a bit 
different then that you are used to ? 

Sorry for the late reply... been really busy these past weeks.

Cheers
RicB


        So, which hammer characteristics do you say promote "fatness"
        and which
        characteristics inhibit "fatness"?

        Kent


    On Fri, Nov 21, 2008 at 3:18 AM, Richard Brekne <ricb at
    pianostemmer.no>wrote:

     >
     > One other point.  Adding lacquer, like deep shoulder needling most
     > definitely DOES have a significant impact on the sound.  The
    affect is quite
     > a bit more subtle but an appropriate lower shoulder support is
    necessary for
     > both body and longevity of  any voicing regardless of approach. 
    Anyone who
     > does not hear this should spend some time either deep needling
    hard hammers
     > or heavily juicing only the lower shoulders on as many sets of
    hammers it
     > takes to start noticing the difference. Too little or too much
    support
     > limits the dynamic range of the hammers body or fatness.
     > Cheers
     > RicB
     >