Wanna be piano tuner

[Kristinn Leifsson]

Hello Melissa!

I love newcomers because they take me seriously for a little while :)

Welcome to the List.  This is a good forum.

Remember, the List is not about chicken feed, chickens in general, or any 
poultry-related topic, although we accept that Mr. Paul Chick does opt for 
keeping his name.  This is about pianos, and any off topic discussions are 
looked upon with utmost scorn and severity.

So there you have it :)


Seems to me that you have it figured out, method-wise.
My advice to you as far as actual tuning goes is to learn to do it aurally 
(by ear).
That´s the way I learned it, and as far as I´m concerned it´s the "right" 
way to begin with at least.  After you master that, you can begin to 
consider other possibilities which are interesting.

Many respectable subscribers to the List started out with an ETD 
(electronic tuning devil) ;) to begin with to get acquainted with the 
tuning process.  However, if you start out the old fashioned way, the 
likelihood of the ETD of becoming a crutch is not as great.

Now I will sit back and put on my flame suit, for I am doused in napalm and 
just dropped a match...


Good luck, buckbuckaw!

Kristinn Leifsson,
Reykjavík, Iceland

P.S Did you by any chance try to learn tuning from an analog cassette ?  I 
heard about that being done somewhere :)





At 14:20 30.9.2000 -0400, you wrote:
>Hello!
>
>My name is Melissa Roen.  I'm new to this list this morning.  Ordinarily I
>read a list for a while before posting, but I'm just so excited about this
>that I wanted to post now.  I went through this lists' archives and couldn't
>find a specific answer to my exact question, although I bet someone has asked
>it and I just can't find it.  Anyway, I posted a message to this effect on
>rec.music.makers.piano this morning already, but I know I'll get more and
>better responses here.
>
>I'm a 29-year-old court reporter living in San Jose, California.  I have
>played the piano since I was four years old and have had a lot of musical
>training through private lessons and as a music major in College and at Aspen
>Music School.  Today I play mostly for my own pleasure and to relieve the
>organist at our church from time to time.  (Yes, I play the organ too, but
>that's not the point here!)
>
>Anyway, I have arrived at a point where I have a little money and a little
>time to learn a skill I have desired since high school:  I want to learn to
>tune and repair pianos.
>
>I took a correspondence course as a teenager, with disastrous results.  Now I
>understand I had a very poor tuning hammer provided and the information I
>received was poorly delivered and, at worst, just plain wrong.  This time I
>want to do things "right."  What I'm trying to ascertain is what is the best
>way to go about this?  My specific goal is to eventually take and pass the
>RPT exam.
>
>All I have done so far is purchased a book, "Piano Servicing, Tuning, and
>Rebuilding," by Arthur A. Reblitz.  What I am thinking is rather than go the
>correspondence course way, I should read the book thoroughly; buy the best
>equipment I can afford -- what specifically, I'm not yet sure of, nor where
>to buy it; buy some of the other videotapes and books recommended at the back
>if the book and study them; and then hire someone who is already a RPT to
>teach me one-on-one until I get the hang of it.  I also plan to join the
>Piano Technician's
>Guild.
>
>I would go to a school, but there are none in my area (San Jose, California).
>
>
>So to summarize:
>Is this the truly the best way to learn?
>What equipment do I need to buy?  Where should I get it from?
>Should I reconsider taking a correspondence course?
>Is there anything else I should know about?
>
>Thanks for letting me pick your collective brains!
>
>Best wishes,
>Melissa
>hotsteno@cs.com
>
>
>Melissa Roen
>CSR No. 12284
>Pulone & Stromberg
>Certified Shorthand Reporters