<HTML><FONT FACE=arial,helvetica><FONT SIZE=2>In a message dated 01/29/2001 10:12:31 AM US Eastern Standard Time,
<BR>Billbrpt@AOL.COM writes:
<BR>
<BR>
<BR><BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">She thinks I "tightened the strings too much".
<BR>She said she saw me working once and it looked to her that I was
<BR>"tightening
<BR>everything really hard".
<BR>
<BR>They also haven't paid the bill for the tuning that I did now 30 days ago
<BR>even though they had always been prompt before, sometimes even paying when
<BR>I
<BR>completed the job that day. When I left the bill on the desk, I saw my
<BR>last
<BR>invoice sitting there marked, "Hold until next bill." </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=3 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="arial" LANG="0"></BLOCKQUOTE>
<BR></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000" SIZE=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" FACE="Arial" LANG="0">
<BR>I tuned for a church with almost precisely the same story (Kawai concert
<BR>grand, treble strings more often than bass). I gave up explaining that there
<BR>was no such thing as "too tight" if the piano was in tune. The "fault" will
<BR>be yours, no matter what temperament you use, because they would otherwise
<BR>have to admit that they a) made a poor purchase, or b) are not the skilled
<BR>musicians they conceive themselves to be. When I tried softening the hammers
<BR>a little, increasing the let-off a little, etc. I got the complaint that the
<BR>pianist had to hit the keys so hard to get a good volume that her fingers
<BR>hurt. ( I didn't soften it all that much.)
<BR>The bottom line is that there is no quick, easy solution; only expensive
<BR>and/or complicated ones. You can try to instruct them for a little while, but
<BR>if they don't listen after a while, you have to make it clear that they need
<BR>to pay you for the work that you did and wish the next tuner well. Less
<BR>heartburn in the long run.
<BR>I like the suggestion about having the pianist cover the cost of breaking
<BR>things in the piano. I'll remember that for the next time.
<BR>Sometime I'll tell the story of the pastor that got KO'd by a breaking bass
<BR>string.
<BR>John Stroup</FONT></HTML>