[pianotech] Understanding Aftertouch

[Tom Servinsky]

I'll speak as a technician and pianist.
Advanced pianist learned to enjoy a piano when they can feel a completeness through the entire movement of the action. Whether playing triple forte or ulta pianissimo, the pianist must feel a sense of completeness, void of any interferece or premature landing.  That's a pianist's perspective. 

>From a technician's perspective, aftertouch is the margin of movement allowing the jack to go through let-ff in all types of conditions. The trick is understanding how to stay within the margin and not introduce and unwanted feel to the pianist. Having a secure understanding of action regulation gives one the luxury of "robbing Peter to pay Paul". In other words we can shorten the hammer blow to increase aftertouch. Or increase keydip to gain more aftertouch. Or raise the key height. These are all areas that can be fudged with to gain or reduce aftertouch. The problem begin when we take too many liberties in one area to gain in another. And thereinlies the crossraods that technicians must contend with. 
Enter David Stanwood and his brilliant observations.
Due to incorrect geometry issues  which plague many reputable pianos from the factory, we as technciians are always trying to make actions perform better by compensating one area in order to improve another. Many times we are treating the symptons and not the disease. 
Actions with incorrect key ratios will exhibit some inherant problems which will relates to the piano having gross limitations. Try explaining that to  an artist in front of a $100,000 concert grand on a major venue with 3 hrs before showtime.
The bottom line is that, as technicians, we have to learn what pianos feel like. That's why I'm a big advocate of playing the piano. And I mean really learning to play the piano. That's the best way to understand the pianist's point of view.
Lastly, understanding aftertouch is like cooking with salt. Using too little salt makes food taste bland. Too much salt is unbearable. Somewhere in the middle is a sweet spot of being just right.
It's up to us as technicians to find that sweet spot.
 Think of aftertouch in those terms and you'll quickly gain an appreciate of how this little nuance  affect a piano's feel. 
Tom Servinsky
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: David Nereson 
  To: pianotech at ptg.org 
  Sent: Saturday, April 18, 2009 4:48 AM
  Subject: Re: [pianotech] Understanding Aftertouch


  Hello,
   
  I am trying to grasp the production and feeling of Aftertouch in a fine regulation.  Can anyone explain how much a person who plays the piano normally can feel or tell if there is aftertouch.  

      I would say that it's mainly semi-pro's and pro's who would notice the amount of aftertouch, or whether there's some or none.  The average casual player doesn't even notice when there's too much lost motion (in a vertical) or too-wide let-off until you point it out.  

  I have read all of the PACE materials on the subject and some other sources, and while they explain how much in thousands the key dip might continue and looking for wippen and hammer rise they don't say how much for the last two.  It seems that viewing hammer rise to gauge aftertouch would be the easiest to determine.

  Yes, that and the damper.    
   
  So how much does or should the hammer rise be?

  There's no set answer for all pianos.  It depends on the player's preference.  Just so there's some.  I'd say if the hammer rises more than about 1/8", that's getting excessive.   
   
  When the cycle of let off and drop is complete how much pressure on the key is needed to see or feel the aftertouch that is or is not present?  (the pressure required to push a button on an elevator or enough to feel the FR punching compressing)

  If there's any aftertouch at all, and (this is important) if you depress the key slowly enough, drop should happen before the key bottoms out, or just as it's starting to compress the punching.  You shouldn't have to exert extra compressing force into the punching to make the hammer finish letting off or to drop.  That would be no aftertouch.
      [I don't have experience with the conical punchings.]  
       --David Nereson, RPT
   
   Steven Hopp
  Midland, TX



------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  Windows Live™: Life without walls. Check it out. 


e 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech_ptg.org/attachments/20090418/f0e94a5c/attachment.html>