Jack Houweling wrote: >Welcome back Richard, > >I am interested in going to Japan in the future to take the same course. > >Sounds like you had a good time, hope you could tell us about it . Did you >learn any trade secrets. > >Jack Houweling > > > Hey there Jack. I'd recommend the Hamamatsu school to anyone, regardless of your particular level of expertise. They will definatly press you do work better and faster regardless of how much you know from the get go. I'm going to write a bit more about the school in a later post so I'll leave it there for now. Trade secrets ??... grin.. just asked the usual questions about some of the more controversial items that come up here from time to time, and I've posted on that in the past. One quick note tho... for home pianos the Japanese voice very very soft. The idea that they like the light and bright sound is just not true at all. They voice nearly to the point of becoming mushy. And, for the cheaper models they use very hard hammers that need very much needling work to get the elasticity up. The Yamaha folks are very much against the use of laquer or softening agents. Indeed, they rather scoff at the use of such. That said, Watanabe Piano Supply Co. states that they sell significant quantities of both hardning agents and softening agents to domestic technicians. Still, the voicing instructors can very quickly acheive just about any kind of a voice without more then a needling tool, some emory cloth, and a string pull. Impressive. Interesting to note that they took such a traditional standpoint to the whole question tho. More later Cheers RicB
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