<HTML><BODY style="word-wrap: break-word; -khtml-nbsp-mode: space; -khtml-line-break: after-white-space; "><SPAN class="Apple-style-span">A crucial component of my class in Kansas City will be simple, practical, powerful tips and tools for getting and staying relaxed while tuning. I invite you all to come and check it out; I've got a serious and chronic disease, and I've found really good ways to treat my body with love and respect while working on pianos, because I've <SPAN class="Apple-style-span" style="text-decoration: underline;">had</SPAN> to in order to keep working.<DIV>So they're road-tested and "survival of the fittest"-quality techniques and protocols. </DIV><DIV>David Andersen</DIV><DIV><BR><DIV><DIV>On Mar 19, 2007, at 9:54 PM, Thomas Cole wrote:</DIV><BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><A href="mailto:A440A@aol.com">A440A@aol.com</A> wrote:</DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE type="cite"><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Relaxation is key,(as with so many things), and the repetitive nature of our work lends itself to these kinds of problems.<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN>We have to think looser, work looser, and be very conscientious about the ergonomics involved.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Malinda Powell gave a class in which she demonstrated a technique for keeping the forearms loose.<SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN>It helped a great deal. <SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN>Good luck,</DIV><P style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; min-height: 14.0px"><SPAN class="Apple-converted-space"> </SPAN></P></BLOCKQUOTE><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Another way of thinking about forearm relaxation is to do what a pianist does, which is to apply only enough force to depress the key (with sufficient volume). It doesn't take nearly as much pressure to keep the key down after it's played.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Also, if you have a physical injury curtailing your tuning practice, now might be a good time to develop a techinique to reliably set the tuning pins using tuning hammer technique as much as possible. It would be hard to describe in English and different pianos require different approaches, but you might as well be kind to your ears as well.</DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; min-height: 14px; "><BR></DIV><DIV style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; ">Tom Cole</DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE></DIV><BR></DIV></SPAN></BODY></HTML>