preparations

[Mark Schecter]

Hi, Tish.

I would like to point out something that other responders have not. 
First, you asked what technical effect preparations might have on the 
strings. Really, I think, probably very little, for the most part. (But 
more below). Second, you mentioned the hassle you get from know-nothing 
organisers. The answers to both these come together.

The big difference between all the examples previously given (guitar, 
etc.) and your situation is, you are not playing your own piano, you are 
playing someone else's piano, whose care is entrusted to a piano 
technician, working together with a staff of stage crew, organizers, 
perhaps other musicians or faculty, etc. If you want to prepare your own 
piano, you can do absolutely anything you want, and who would complain? 
Knock yourself out! But when you come to play the piano in a public 
space that I or one of my colleagues have to take care of, the situation 
becomes a lot more complicated.

Most technicians in charge of concert instruments live with them on a 
long term basis, and have to ensure that they perform up to the level of 
expectations of their various users over a period of many years, whether 
this means students, teachers, performers, or deities. Life is difficult 
enough, negotiating the varied requests made by this range of people, 
without inviting or permitting uncontrolled access to the inner workings 
of the piano.

I, for one, have had several experiences where a performer, without 
permission, has inserted a variety of objects between strings, and also 
has used various objects and materials to pluck, strike, caress, and 
otherwise stimulate the strings. Upon leaving, they neglect to count 
their sponges, leaving this or that plastic or felt or wood or metal 
object somewhere in the piano, not to be discovered until some much less 
convenient time. They also leave their finger oils and other bodily 
substances on the strings, plate, and damper heads, and their markings 
or markers on the strings, plate, and damper heads, including permanent 
ink on felt, permanent glue on paper tags, scratches on wood, paint and 
sludge in bass string windings, and who knows what else?

So, even though nothing _really_ serious has ever happened (on my watch, 
anyway), there have been enough hassles requiring technical effort to 
resolve, or which become an indelible part of the pianos markings, that 
the technician, staff, and/or crew, faculty, and other stakeholders 
agree on some limiting policy to protect the instrument. This policy 
might range from deciding that it is not in the long-term best interests 
of the instrument to allow preparations at all, to allowing only 
certain, pre-screened preparations with supervision, to entrusting the 
pianist to be responsible for inserting and removing her items herself 
with the proviso that the pianist will pay for any repairs that might be 
required.

Anyway, the point is, you are running up against the policies that have 
evolved in reaction to previous negative experience, and even if those 
policies seem wrong-headed to you, to those who have to maintain the 
equipment for the next umpteen years and hundreds of performers, they 
are the best compromise they have been able to arrive at to deal with 
any number of varied requests, some very left-field. It's just easier to 
say no. I know this doesn't make your life as a performer any easier, 
and it limits your opportunities to perform repertoire that requires 
preparations, but I hope this explains some of the reasons why these 
limits are imposed.

-Mark Schecter


tish mukarji wrote:
> Hello list,
> 
> I'm a pianist who does mostly contemporary music, and
> I use a lot of preparations, I was wondering what your
> thoughts on this use does to the strings. If I play a
> set of one hour with screws lodged inbetween a few
> strings what type of technical effect will it have.
> Granted that you can badly prepare a piano, but say I
> don't hit the keys with preparations to hard.
> Basically at times I get a lot of hassle from
> organisers who don't know anything. I met a very nice
> technician in Scotland who was very open. So I would
> like to know your views on the subject.
> Thanks in advance,
> T