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David Stanwood of West Tisbury receives piano-tuning patent

© By Susan L. Silk
Martha's Vineyard Times
Published: April 20, 2011

A lifetime of loving the piano, four years of research and development and two years of crossing the t's and dotting the i's on the paperwork, and West Tisbury piano innovator David Stanwood now holds a U.S. patent for a mechanism that allows pianists to customize the feel and sound of a piano in a matter of seconds.

David Stanwood holds US Patent number 7,915,509 for his "movable pivot bearing for changing key leverage in stringed keyboard instruments," pictured here.

This patent — # 7,915,509 — is in Mr. Stanwood's words "a movable pivot bearing for changing key leverage in stringed keyboard instruments." The Stanwood adjustable leverage action (SALA) mechanism is installed so that by turning two knobs in the front of the keyboard a pianist may alter the way a piano performs.

Mr. Stanwood explained that in a normal piano there are small discs of felt that sit over pins creating a pivot point and each of the 88-keys rock back and forth. The pin holds the key in place. The SALA mechanism makes the pivot point moveable so that it becomes heavier or lighter as the pianist wishes.

The mechanism allows a pianist to select one of five unique keyboard settings and so customize the settings for a Bach symphony or a Chopin concerto, for example. The SALA mechanism "changes the personal relationship, changes what the piano is to the pianist. It changes the relationship and that has a huge value. It increases the quality of the performance, the joy of playing and the possibilities of the music," Mr. Stanwood said.

"It allows the pianist to be their best in a way that was never possible before. They can actually tune these knobs and find their 'sweet spot' where they really start to kick and feel something special. Quite often before this it was a question of technique which not everybody has. So it really broadens the availability of a perfect instrument," he said.

The mechanism may be retrofitted into existing pianos or built into a piano as it is being originally constructed. To date nine grand pianos have been custom-fit with the mechanism and, Mr. Stanwood said, another five customers are waiting for the installation. Concert halls and private owners of high-end pianos are his customers to date. The mechanism costs $10,000 to install.

Mr. Stanwood installed the first SALA mechanism in a nine-foot Steinway concert piano owned by Brandeis University in Waltham. "We wanted to start somewhere that was not a major conservatory. We wanted to test it someplace small to make sure everything is working. "

Brandeis University PhD student Jared Redmond, age 25, is the first pianist to play a SALA-retrofitted grand piano in a concert setting and first performed with the SALA on September 12, 2010. During a telephone interview with The Times, Mr. Redmond said," From my perspective the most remarkable benefit is that all of a sudden one piano becomes many pianos."


The rest of the article and a picture here...

http://www.mvtimes.com/marthas-vineyard/article.php?id=5292

How could we have ever lived without this for the past 300 years?

Bach didn't write any more symphonies than Pythagoras tuned Steinway grands.

Kees

-> BWV 787-801, Dreistimmige Sinfonien. (Usually a basic part of any serious piano education)

Touché, Bernhard.

(That settles it then. Pythagoras must have tuned at least 15 Steinway grands.)

Yawn.

If the balance rail moves forward or backward and the keys go along for the ride, wouldn't this have implications for checking?

For example, if the backchecks were regulated very closely to check as high as possible, wouldn't the hammer tails drag on the backchecks when the balance rail is moved toward the player? Conversely, if the checking is relatively low, wouldn't the hammers barely check at all when the balance rail is moved away from the player?

Perhaps I'm missing something...

The pin need not be the pivot. I am guessing that the rail moves, but not the pins.

Another great idea that no manufacturer will ever use. At $10,000, it is priced way out of reach for most people. It makes Scott Jones' springy thingy look far more attractive for the pianos that play like trucks. It's only a few hundred bucks.

I wonder if the Chinese will manage to produce a cheap knock off version of it and get away with it?

How can that be, since presumably the pins are installed in the rail? Where else could they be?

Those are not symphonies. I assume you know what a symphony is.

Kees

Details and video here:
Stanwood SALA

David has been displaying his new device at the annual PTG conferences the past couple of years. It appears to work very well. The ability to change action ratio on the fly is pretty amazing. It will be interesting to see how artists react to it.

Now the next step is to connect it to a pedal!

Looking at the pictures, I am not sure what is being moved. My point is that the pin is a guide, but the punchings are the pivot.

Apparently he knows a bit about piano design. For his work on touch weight, he has letters of praise from Garrick Ohlsen and others:

http://www.stanwoodpiano.com/first.htm and

http://www.stanwoodpiano.com/letters.htm

I'm wondering who's resposibility will it be to get the piano dialed in before the concert. Would it be the tech, the pianist, or would a new employment opportunity open as the dedicated "knob guy"?

This opens up a veritable minefield of utterly tasteless jokes. Showing uncharacteristic restraint, I've decided not to go there.

I took a close look at the picture on his website and from what I can tell, the leveling punchings remain around the pin as usual, but the bearing "mound", for lack of a better term, is what moves front to back. It looks like these mounds have a slot in them and seem to be fastened to the rear ends of the brown arms which are attached to the moveable rail.

Pretty ingenious, I'd say! I look forward to seeing this in person.

Ah, that would be better than what I was suspecting: the balance rail and pin and entire key moving. I was wondering what that could do to blow distance and hence aftertouch when there are divots in the whippen cushion, not to mention problems with dampers! Still with the rail moving and changing the ratio, aftertouch would have to change, too. Right?