<HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>Re: [CAUT] William Wolfram</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY> Wim, It was this sort of situation that would prompt my dad to ask the question,= “So, did he kiss you, too?”  The faculty calling in anothe= r tech without telling you is about as far from a “warm fuzzy” a= s you can get.  Your personality and behavior may be exacerbating the s= ituation (see Don Rose’s comments), but it looks like there is more to= it than that.  Definitely glean as much information as you can from wh= at the other guy did, to find objective reasons why they might be mor= e pleased.  Also, remember that the fact that Somebody Else worked on t= he piano is probably a factor, too. The first few months I was here at Missouri, I had a devil of a time keepin= g everybody happy with the recital hall pianos, and I’ve been doing lo= cal concert tuning for years.  The piano faculty came to me and suggest= ed I call in my predecessor, who I have known for years and is now semi-reti= red, for some consultation.  I did so and learned a lot about what they= like, and things are a lot better now.  Going behind your back like th= at is another matter entirely.  I may be overreacting, but I would be v= ery insulted and unsettled if it happened to me.  I hope you have your = parachute ready.  You at least have some serious fence-mending to do, a= nd it looks like the initiative will have to be all yours. Ken Z. On 3/8/05 9:39 AM, "Wimblees@aol.com" <Wimblees@aol.com> wr= ote: <BLOCKQUOTE>Unbeknown to me, last week the piano faculty got a technician from Birmingh= am to work on the piano. I just so happen to walk by the concert hall and he= ard the piano being tuned. I didn't even know the guy, although I had heard = of him. (He works for the local Kawai/Baldwin/Schimmel dealer). Anyway, afte= r he got done, I played the piano, and found about a dozen notes that stuck = out, either as too dull or too bright. When we had a meeting last week, (the= piano faculty, the chair, and me), one of the faculty members, (who is play= ing a recital in a couple of weeks), said the piano sounded so much better, = but there were still a few notes that needed tweeking. So I offered to spend= some time on the piano on Sunday, but only if he agreed to stand by my side= , and tell me which notes needed work, and stay there until I had it just th= e way he wanted. About an hour before he was scheduled to show up, I tuned t= he piano, and identified the notes I though needed voicing. When he got ther= e, I asked him to show me the notes he thought needed voicing. Guess what, w= e only agreed on two notes. The rest he didn't say anything about. When I po= inted them out, he said they sounded fine to him. (He said one was just out = of tune, which it wasn't). What frustrated me, is that he didn't stick aroun= d. He left after a few minutes. So I just fixed the three notes he said need= ed work, and closed up the piano. But I did send him an email explaining my = frustration, basically stating that the problem we have is that I hear thing= s different than he does, and that is why communicating is so important. I a= lso pointed out that he now has to come back and play the piano again, befor= e his recital, and show me if there are any more notes he wants corrected. <= BR>   Wim   </BLOCKQUOTE> -- Ken Zahringer, RPT Piano Technician MU School of Music 297 Fine Arts 882-1202 cell 489-7529 </BODY> </HTML>