Today I had my free in-home visit for a Nordiska 126 I bought a couple of months ago. The store tuner is a Chinese national who trained at Dongbei, so I assume she is competent. When I mentioned voicing the hammers to make the sound less bright, she told me to wait as long as possible, and to leave the felt undisturbed.

I figure this could be for a few possible reasons. She might not feel comfortable with her voicing skills. She might think this is outside what is included in the free tuning. Or she might be giving me good advice.

Personally, I would assume the sound will only get brighter as the felts harden. It doesn't seem logical that the sound could become less bright by doing nothing. The piano was already sitting at the dealer's shop two years before I bought it. Am I off in my thinking? Is voicing in order or should I wait. If it's relevant, the hammers are reputedly Abel.

If anyone thinks voicing is in order and could tell me what the customary charge would be, or recommend someone in the LA area who I might contact for the work, please send me a PM.

Thanks

Turandot,

You can and should have the piano voiced whenever you're not happy with the sound. New pianos frequently need to be voiced to their new environments/owners. If the piano seems too bright for you or the room, then by all means find a good technician, explain to him/her your wishes and sound/tone requirements and off you go to a better sounding piano!

turandot,

All pianos should be voiced when it becomes necessary. If you feel that the piano is too bright, then it is due for voicing to bring the tonal palate into line with your taste.

There is absolutely no advantage in delaying voicing except perhaps, for the dealer being able to save a small cost by delaying it for a time so that the costs can be charged to you.

I'd recommend that you get on the phone and ask the dealer to address the problem. Furthermore, they should cover the cost of the work.

It is quite common for dealers to offer one free in home service. This is a good practice, since it provides an opportunity for the service technician also to assess the voicing of the instrument in the particular home environment. The voicing requirements of a piano will vary according to the acoustical space in which the piano is housed. For those who find this concept strange, I can assure you that this is the case. Over many years of hiring instruments for concert use, I have found it amazing how the same instrument can sound so different in a different venue. The perception of brightness or otherwise depends on the acoustics of the space. Houses are just as variable, and the voicing requirements in the domestic situation will also vary.

Combine the two factors of variability, the acoustic space of the house and taste of the client, and you have a strong case for final voicing at the time of the first home service, along with whatever is required while the piano is on the showroom floor.

Ron O.

hello Turandot

Voicing is a subjective thing....your piano needs voiced only when YOU are not happy with the sound it is making(generally speaking). If you aren't happy with the brightness of the sound...then have it voiced!

The fact that your technician is Chinese is an interesting turn of events because as I have explained before on these forums the Oriental/Far Eastern ear is attuned to find hard, bright tones pleasant(and I think your piano is built in China????Correct me if this is wrong plz). If you've ever watched an oriental movie, you will aware that the music is usually all that 'jangly' stuff with bright, harsh, hard tones.This is because the people of the Far East are more accustomed to hard, bright tones in their music....they like it...and as such pianos from Japan,China,Korea etc use hard hammers in order to achieve a brightness.
The European and North American ear, however, is more attuned to more mellow tones, and so it is interesting that you find your piano too bright in tone....but your Chinese technician thinks it sounds fine!!

See what I mean???!! .....voicing is a subjective thing!!! If YOU dont like it....then it needs voiced!!!

Best Regards

Mark

Pianos get brighter as they are played. The felt compacts at the strike point. It's just a fact of life. The struggle is to keep them toned down. That's why we most often are filing and needling. If someone is complaining that a piano is too bright, it's only going to get worse as the instrument ages. I will occasionally advise someone to wait and play a piano in a little bit if the complaint is that they want it brighter, but not if it is already too bright.

The only warning I will add is that the person doing the work should be satisfied that the tuning has stabilized. Many problems with voicing are actually problems with tuning, and vice versa.

So voicing is not simply a subjective thing, but fundamentally a racist thing!

Or is this just an exercise in maximal political incorrectness?

Well, Mike...I guess you're old!!! Political correctness has gone mad now....as judged by your last remark!!! Now someone cannot even mention race in a sentence???????

Living life by the 'political correctness law' of today, if I say "Chinese"...it's a racist remark.....OH NO!!!!LOCK ME UP!!!.....that guy said "Chinese"......that guy said "African American"...that guy said "Polish"..........oh no!!!lock him up!!!!!!Planes are going to fall from the sky and volcanoes will spontaneously erupt.....damnation on us all because I said "Chinese"!!!!!!!! WISE UP!!!!!

I'm just stating a difference between the European and North American(oh no!!!!.....am I allowed to say "North American"?????)ear, and the Far Eastern ear(oh no!!!!!!.....am I allowed to say "Far Eastern"?????)

Wise up Casalborgone and get ur head out of your arse!!! Political correctness is the voice of cowardice!!!!!

Im from Ireland...but I promise not to spontaneously combust if you call me Irish!!!!!!!

Mike,

I should have known I would run into you here too.

Please, if you want to throw gasoline and light a match instead of sharing the useful information that I'm quite sure you have, then could you PLEASE STAY OFF OF MY THREAD. Posts like yours here...(and elsewhere) just drive other people away.

To clarify the situation for those who have been kind enough to share their knowledge:

1. The piano was always a bit bright for me. I bought it because the action was exactly what I wanted, figured I'd deal with toning the sound down later.

2. The Cninese tech trained at Dongbei. The piano is also a Dongbei. Nordiska is just a brand name for this particular grade of Dongbei.
I think she knows my piano inside out.

3. I'm not going to push for free voicing. I'd rather the store tech not get involved with my hammers if she's reluctant to do it for whatever reason. The price the store gave me on the piano was more than good enough. I would actually prefer to deal with an independent tech.

4. Whoever said the Chinese tech may prefer a bright tone due to her cultural background is completely correct. She was more than pleased when she finished tuning, and played for about twenty minutes. (I went out to my garden)

5. My only concern about voicing was wondering if the needling, juicing, carding,... whatever you name those things that you folks do, begins a process of slow deterioration of the original felt material.

Thanks for all the helpul replies. More are always welcome.

Hello again Turandot

the needling of the hammers will, of course, mean a change in the original felt...but as for a deterioration?...I dont think so. The felt is compressed so hard that a little needling should change the tone of the piano....but you shouldn't worry about the hammers falling off anytime soon!

Kindest Regards

Mark

Hi turandot

You probably did not expect me to get involved in a thread on this forum as I am not a tuner or technician. Still from reading you comments I understand your piano sounds too bright as to your taste. So yes have it voiced/needled and if will not "deteriorate" the hammers, which is not to say the result will last for ever. Hammers will harden again after extensive play and you may well have it voiced again in the future.

I also looked back at the pictures you posted of your piano and noticed it is placed quite close to the wall. If you have not done so far, you might also want to experiment a bit with the wall distance and try out various distances from where it is now up to say 20" from the wall. The tonal balance of an upright changes substantially with the distance from the wall in a complex process of interference and cancellation of soundwaves being directed from the soundboard to the wall and reflected back from the wall to the soundboard. In that way the balance between bass, tenor and high treble will change. Should you do a search of the kind [wall distance] either on this forum or the piano forum, you will find a lot of comments on this.

schwammerl.

The technician from the store probably has no incentive to voice at a store paid for in home tuning. The service price is pre-determined by the dealer and whatever extra time she spends on your piano will be uncompensated unless you decide to tip her.

BTW, I don't necessarily agree with Mark on the bright sound/Asian thing. I just think they make hard hammers because it's faster and prettier.

But I don't discount the thought either. At least Kawai is finally getting away from hammer shaped rocks.

Voice it whenever you want a change.

Some of us are very sensitive to certain harmonics, and will hear them as out of tune in a more offensive way than others might ... then with voicing them down, the same tuner may do a job we now find to be great. The 2 things interreact, as has been said.

Cultural differences are real, and there would be no such words as 'cliche' and 'stereotype' if it weren't often (but not always) the factual case that people think and act in habituated and socialized paks just like the other animals!

It would be wonderful if we were all so unique as to escape stereotypes, but it's not that world. Prejudice is different than seeing the inevitable patterns that do exist.

Then again, I may just be defending another Irishman no matter the cause, and itching for a fight myself! :p

I have to second the argument that the tuning must be very stable- depending on the instrument this would be on the second in-home tuning or later- before voicing. I think piano makers are actually expecting at least a little voicing for warranty tunings, but some of us are either too lazy, or, we are very satisfied with the tone. It is really difficult for a piano technician to attain the customer's ideals, especially when using subjective terms like "bright" or "mellow", instead of the more exact descriptions like, "attack too slow" "hard attack" "sustain too short" or.... "front duplex noise"
Have fun!