low quality, and high quality

[Billbrpt@AOL.COM]

In a message dated 4/9/99 5:02:56 AM Central Daylight Time, A440A@AOL.COM 
writes:

<< I am not refusing to work on "Mrs. Jones" spinet because it is a piece 
 of marketing garbage,  I refer her on because she would be a lot better 
 served with a $60 tuning than a $100 tuning.  
      I tune for the money, and the best return I have found on my time is 
 with the most expensive pianos.  We should all continually attempt to make 
 our time more valuable as our careers progress , and this will often cause a 
 gradual evolution in the ol' Rolodex.  
     If a technician feels a moral obligation to attend to all the pianos of 
 the world,  God bless them.  I don't feel that need, just give me a steady 
 diet of the good ones and I will suffer in silence.  
 Regards to all, 
 Ed Foote 
      >>
Ed,

If I lived in Los Angeles where, I grew up, I might well be doing studio and 
concert work with only a few prestige clients on the side too.  But I chose 
and prefer to live in a small town where there are concerts, to be sure, but 
the bulk of tuning income is in homes, schools and churches.  I'm sure that 
it is this way for the majority of working piano technicians.  Those who have 
positions like you do are a rarity.  I could live in New York for example and 
work for Steinway or Yamaha but you couldn't get me to relocate there for 
love nor virtually any amount of money that this business might provide.

While I work on many fine, expensive pianos, I also work on modest ones as 
well and charge the same rate no matter which piano, no matter where it is.  
It is not uncommon for me to get more money working on a piano such as an 
Acrosonic, a piano that I truly enjoy working on, than I would working on a 
piano for a live music event.

I have seen a few of the pianos from Eastern Europe that Antares spoke of and 
they really are bad.  There is no comparison between them and good American 
brands such as the Baldwin Acrosonic, the Kimballs, the Wurlitzers, the Cable 
Nelsons, etc.

  As one example, I recently got $300 to repair the damper rod in a Kimball 
console where one of the L-shaped hangars had fractured.  I knew what was 
wrong with "the pedal" from previous experience.  It is not a common problem 
but it does occur, I knew instantly what the diagnosis was and that I needed 
to do some careful disassembly, take the piece out and home to where I have a 
drill press and to return and reassemble.  

The piano is about 18 years old, has an oak case in what I would describe as 
"mint" condition, in a large, beautiful home in the suburbs.  The family's 
children are all in lessons and were active in Solo & Ensemble contests at 
their school when the very well maintained instrument "broke down".

Last week, I tuned a 30 year old blond Acrosonic in another fine home in the 
suburbs where the gentleman had inherited the piano from his mother and 
bought very light colored wood furnishings and other decor to compliment the 
center piece of the room, the piano.  It was clean inside and in perfect 
regulation but needed a good, solid tuning that he paid a 3 figure price for. 
 It was the loudest, fullest, richest sounding piano of its type I had ever 
heard and told him so.  He was delighted with my assessment as he was with 
the custom, Equal Beating Victorian Temperament tuning that I provided.  
Needless to say, I didn't rant about "poor scaling" and walk out frustrated 
after two hours of "not being able to get my 3rds right".

On Tuesday, I removed the white keys and sent them out to be recovered, then 
cleaned, filed hammers and tightened the action on another Acrosonic that 
belongs to an elderly woman in my neighborhood who has had me tune it for 
many years.  This is something she has been looking forward to for a long 
time but has been waiting until her grandchildren had grown up sufficiently 
so they wouldn't be apt to damage her new keytops the way small children 
sometimes do.

  I have already earned in 2 hours what many tuners do in an entire day on 
this piano (a piece of "marketing garbage"?)  and still have the rest of the 
job to do for about the same price when the keys come back from Phil de Hahn, 
RPT (who does really great work).  She also referred me to her two daughters 
who live on the same street and who had also recently acquired pianos that 
both needed extra services at 3 figure rates.

I am just as content, if not more to service these pianos and work for people 
who are truly happy with my work than I would be to work in some high profile 
environment where I might not be able to earn as much money to say nothing of 
the amount of gratitude and respect that I receive.

I have heard tuners as long as I have been in this business and have also 
seen them on this List trashing Kimballs, Wurlitzers and Acrosonics.  Their 
remarks are *always* in bad taste and uncalled for.  They tend to reflect, 
however, those people's attitude toward their work in general and all you 
have to do is look at some of the finer instruments they supposedly take care 
of to see the reflection of their contempt for professional standards in 
general.

I would suggest that unless such a person should want to be identified with 
the very contempt that he/she has for the piano industry and service 
profession, that every effort be made to refrain from making blanket 
statements about any particular brand or type of piano in general.  There are 
other people than technicians who read and consult this List.  I, for one, do 
not like being put in the position of having to contradict the conclusion 
that someone has drawn about a particular piano or type of piano based upon 
someone else's careless, disrespectful and flippant remark.

Sincerely,
Bill Bremmer RPT
Madison, Wisconsin