<html><body> <DIV>Hi Dean,</DIV> <DIV>That's an interesting idea about the tubing.  I'm having trouble though visualizing what you mean, tubing, some sort of cover over the pin?  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>You mention high and low harmonics.  Im curious, when I play the f3a3 third, I hear two things, a low wave & a higher wa wa wa wa wa.  Which If I flatten or sharpen the note, the wa wa wa seems to either slow down or speed up, but the other is hard to detect at times.  w hat is your take on that phenomina?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I do try to go fast on the piano, but I have this problem.  If a fourth is out, or a fifth sounds too stretched or narrow, I can' tjust leave it and move on.  I have to fix it.  Actually, I try to fix everything, why is my son crying, how can I fix it? :)  He's teething, you can't." :)  Anyway, although I'm not a pro like you guys, I'm still putting my name out there because eventually when people call, I'll be ready.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>In you marketing approach, you mentioned post cards, etc.  I tried telemarketing banquet halls, bed and breakfasts today.  the furthest I got with it was about three or four said to sen d a business card.  One lady took my name and #.  I left a ton of messages.  Any ideas on this? and how to get past that "not being able to leave a note sounding horrible? </DIV> <DIV>Marshall</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid">-------------- Original message -------------- From: "Dean May" <deanmay@pianorebuilders.com> > Hi Duaine, > > Quick and dirty is what it sounds like. You go through one pass just as > fast as you can, 15-20 minutes. Some go faster. You do it by sacrificing > accuracy, obviously. As you get experienced at it, when you come back > for the second pass you find a lot of notes pretty close and needing > only minor tweaking. > > I personally think "speed tuning" is excellent training. It forces you > to focus on the beats that really count and you learn to filter out > trash noise. When someone is first starting out tuning it is easy to get > bogged down in hearing all kinds of noises. You end up spending 4 hours > on one tuning and wearing yourself out totally. My philosophy is to > force yourself to move on to the next note. You gotta figure that first > starting out it will sound bad whether you spend 1 hour or 4 hours. If > you are going to work at it for 4 hours I think the tuning will be > better with 4 one hour passes than one 4 hour pass. You'll learn more, > too. > > Learning to minimize wasted motion is a real key to speed training. Time > spent moving mutes, hammer, fingers, etc is wasted time. An extra 4 > seconds on a pin is an extra 15 minutes of tuning time. Learn to do it > quickly and efficiently. > > Ear plugs are also a must for speed training. They filter out extraneous > noises, all the incoherent white noise in a room. They also lop off the > upper harmonics of the note, which is where a lot of false beats come > from, but they allow the lower harmonics through, the ones you need to > hear. You don't need those upper harmonic frequencies until you get into > octave eight, and there you just pull the plugs out a little bit so more > of them can get through. Ear plugs allow you to focus on the beats you > need to hear and eliminate distracting noise. Plus your ears aren't > totally beat up after 4-6 hours of tuning. Use 'em. Do your final checks > without them in and you'll be amazed at how great the piano sounds. I > use the cheap silicone variety at any drug store. > > For Marshall, specifically, I am sure there are already good techniques > out there that sight impaired tuners use for keeping track of what > tuning pin they are on. Perhaps you could use 8 short lengths of tubing > that will slip over the tuning pins. The first thing you could do is > mark the location of all the A's with a piece of tubing. Then you > wouldn't have to go all the way to one of the breaks to count back to > your position if you get lost. > > Recently I was called out to tune for a jazz concert. The organizer was > a friend of mine and he forgot to schedule in advance. By the time I got > there the musicians and crowd was starting to trickle in. By the time I > was done the room was crowded and noisy. The piano was awful when I > started. I packed in the earplugs and hammered the keys so I could hear > over the crowd. I put a 20 minute tuning on it using RCT and got out of > there. A week later I went back for a real tuning and I was amazed at > how good it sounded. > > Dean > Dean May cell 812.239.3359 > PianoRebuilders.com 812.235.5272 > Terre Haute IN 47802 > > > -----Original Message----- > From: pianotech-bounces@ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org] On > Behalf Of Hechler Family > Sent: Saturday, January 07, 2006 5:31 PM > To: Pianotech > Subject: Re: Pitch Raise > > Gary, > > I still have never caught on to the two pass theory. I still do one pass > and let the customer know that, for it to be better, don't wait so long > between tunings. > > So please expand on your definition of a "quick and dirty" pass. > (meaning actually what do you do - which I probably will try since most > of my customers have old uprights and players. > > Thanks you, > Duaine > > > > _______________________________________________ > pianotech list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives </BLOCKQUOTE></body></html>