<HTML>In a message dated 10/12/01 7:35:08 AM Central Daylight Time, tsheehan@nyc.rr.com (Thomas A. Sheehan) writes: <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">Although interesting as a technical engineering concept, it's really more of a marketing curiosity than something that's genuinely useful. (Much the same could be said of the sostenuto on grands also! - there's so little music written that requires its use). That middle pedal on uprights is much better served by being the controller for a well-designed felt muting rail, such as in the Yamaha U1. Not necessarily "bad/dumb". But when out of regulation, can be a real time-sink, adding additional expense to a customer's bill for something that has such limited use. </BLOCKQUOTE> For some 20 years now, I've used the Sostenuto pedal during both fine tuning and regulation.  If you don't know how to use it for these operations, you're missing the boat!  In my opinion, the Sostenuto pedal is a *requirement*.  If it doesn't function properly or is absent, a less than superior job may be the result.  And yes, highly skilled musicians do use it.  I'd rather see a true Sostenuto pedal on a vertical than any of the other monkey business (pun intended) that it is supposed to do. For my contribution to trivial and useless piano inventions, how about those "violin box" things that Charles Frederick Stein put on the soundboard of his baby grands?  I could never tell that they did anything but collect dust that is impossible to clean. Bill Bremmer RPT Madison, Wisconsin</HTML>