Last year we moved and were delayed by a death in the family. We moved the piano in the middle of a hot, humid July and it sat in the house for 3 weeks covered with many blankets and stuffed with dessicant in little packets... and no air conditioning. poor piano.

I had it tuned soon after and it was not too compromised.

then i had health and money issues this last year. I was playing my piano and thought it was pretty much in tune. I have an excellent ear and can spot voices in my choir that are even the least bit off tune, ... i know which instruments are out of tune and cringe at sharp and flat singing.

It was the biggest surprise to find out how out of tune my piano actually was. the tuner played one note and i cringed. and then another and another.. the whole piano had gone down a bit.

it's funny how i didn't notice. I haven't played with other instruments so i never really had a chance to compare. I guess one gets accustomed and acclimated to how a piano sounds day after day. I love my tuner.. he is so excellent.. he had some major health issues himself this year and was actually glad i didn't call months earlier.

just sharing my 'bad ears' at home.

I can definitely relate, apple. I've spent several months mildly complaining about my teacher's piano being out of tune... now it has become apparent that it's mine that has been out of tune all along (and it's slipped even further, which finally tipped me off). Time to call the tuner. I can't believe my ears just accepted it. I also have pretty good pitch, but apparently when it creeps up on us slowly, something inside us decides it's ok.

Good post.
I have a student with a beat up old clunker of a piano that is way out of tune. Not terrible but pretty bad. I went to tune it and found cracks in the bass bridge among many other problems. I pronounced the piano dead.
We started shopping for pianos and found a really nice sounding 52" studio piano. Nice tone. The student went to play it and decided she liked the sound of her old out of tune, beat up clunker better than the new one! My theory is that she is just used to the sound.
Moral of the story. Don't let your students, your kids or yourself become accustomed to wrong pitches. Have your piano tuned regularly.

Great advice!


Hi, Ben. I see you are from Georgia... don't know what part of Georgia you are from, but I have a proposition for you... I'll teach you what little I know about piano technology, and you can teach me a piano lesson or two!

Rick

just don't tax yourselves.

What if they have separate bank accounts?

Hey, Apple, do you offer distance piano lessons on-line?

I didn't mean to hi-jack your thread...

I too have a keen ear for pitch... I see a lot of YT music videos where the pianist plays well, but on an out-of-tune piano. It does impede the performance (to an extent) from an overall quality of music point of view.

Rick

Somewhere I have a CD by Dave Brubeck—I don’t remember the name right off—I’ve played it once. I like Dave Brubeck’s playing but the piano is so badly out of tune it is offensive.

ddf

This is yet another reason to get regular access to multiple pianos for practice.

Oh dear, Apple....

but you really should have expected it.

New home, no control over heat and humidity, and the poor thing went hither and tither with the changes in weather and its new environment. Sometimes it is hard to hear how off a piano can be if it is rather in tune with itself.

Have you got anything in place for the future? Damp Chaser is a beginning but that only helps with the soundboard, not all the thousands of teeny weeny pieces of wood that make up the action. Is the room shut off from open windows and drafts? (so hard to do with a large family)

I hope that you budget in your tech a few times a year.

Let us know how you make out.

Hugs
LL

The lifetime warranty on my piano is only valid if I have it tuned at least once a year. At first for some reason I was not 100% happy with this, but now I understand it is a good rule!

"Jackpot" just to hear what out of tune might sound like, a sample: ( he does not play too long, he gives it to Joe Morello the drummer)

Sounds a bit Chinese...(just kidding)..well maybe after 10 years..

Not according to Damp Chasers web site which reads as follows:

Permits the tuning to hold better between regular tunings
Minimizes the expansion and contraction of action parts which provides optimum touch and predictable keyboard control
Prevents rust on the strings and metal parts
Minimizes felt deterioration, reducing the harsh tones that come from flattened hammer felt in low humidity or the muffled tones from swollen hammer felt in high humidity
Minimizes glue failure throughout the piano
Protects your investment year after year

I had a student today with a very out of tune 1877 Bluthner piano. I was set to tune it for him soon but today the dad told me that his IRS had his but so he had to hold off until next year. I am tempted to work out some sort of a "tune now, pay later" plan. I don't think that's a great business model (do you?) but I can hardly stand to let the poor kid keep playing on something that sounds so bad, especially when it could easily sound real good for not a whole lot of money.

Rickster, check your messages.

I checked my PM's Monaco, Thanks!

Aliwally, that jazz recording of Dave Brubeck sounded great, but, you are right, the piano tuning was a little off (okay, a lot off:-). The single notes sounded okay... the cords/intervals sounded very disonant. The playing was fantastic!

Rick

oh lily lady.. i am just a perfectionist in the sound department.. the piano is fine.. it if wasn't I'd certainly have it worked on .. and it was only in humidity for 3 weeks. I have a pretty stable environment.

If you have a digital piano at home with the acoustic - would that help our ears spot when the acoustic needs tuning?

Digital pianos are sampled with real pianos... I've heard high end digitals with a slight imperfection in the sampling. Why not just get a real piano!

Rick

Yes. The digital will be absolutely constant. Most are very well tuned, and even if it's slightly off, it's always the same. So, you'll hear the difference in comparison.

This is not the CD I have. On the one I'm referring to the piano is really out of tune.

ddf

I would really like to know what CD that was. Is it a bootleg CD? If not, I can't believe they released albums with out of tune pianos on them. I am always looking for rare CD's. I am quite sure Dave Brubeck will not have any out of tune piano CD's reissued, so that makes it very rare.

I saw a video of Michel Petrucciani years ago, at the very end of the last song he played one note in the uppper register, can't remember what note. It was the one note that was out of tune. We played the video over a few times to point out what he did. Only good ears could tell what he did, I was like floored. That one note, and he smiled when he did it.

No, it is not a bootleg CD; I don’t buy bootleg CDs. The last time I bought a bootleg anything it was a bottle of ‘shine from an illicit establishment in Arkansas. I was really curious to find out what it tasted like. It wasn’t 60 year old Macallan but it wasn’t all that bad either.

As I unpack these things I’ll keep an eye out and, if it is not too far in the distant future, let you know.

ddf

Thanks Del. I did not mean bootleg in the copied CD term. More in the live recorded performances, recorded by someone in the audience. I don't buy bootleg CD's too, the quality is quite bad I am sure. I do have an collection of live recordings from shows I attended, as well as copies from friends who may have recorded. I love technology today, I can sneak a small studio in my pocket and record.