Piano tuner blog showing some of my work and thoughts as a piano tuner working in and around London
This piano has been eaten by moths! Consequently some of the felt has fallen off causing the dampers to click. Luckily this is the worst of it so it's salvageable.
I took the action apart and gave the whole thing a good clean. Hopefully they have gone forever. The client inherited the piano with the moths already in it.
They leave a lot of dust behind.
Had to tune 6 pianos in a school the other day. This old Broadwood grand piano was one of them. About 1880's I guess.
I have seen a few when I first started over 20 years ago but I haven't seen one like this for a long time. This one looks all original and it's all in good working order. They're not worth much as the cost of rebuilding it properly is huge and the resale value doesn't warrant the expense.
Still - it's a nice piece of furniture and looks good in the busy hallway of this school. The other 5 pianos they have are all quite new so they are well stocked.
It's always good to use reputable piano movers. It's better to ask a shop or piano tuner to recommend someone. I have seen many pianos badly damaged by dodgy movers. They all say they have plenty of experience. I always recommend that move pianos and nothing else.
This one was dropped and twisted. The keybed has moved and the action and pedals are all out of alignment. I re-adjusted everything so it works properly but it's a compromise. It's not worth the value of the piano to get it all done properly.
Cleaning a grand piano today. Then a fine tuning.
There are some amazing churches in London. I see stunning design and architecture often in the most normal parts of Lond where you wouldn't expect it. I was tuning a piano in this church today in one of the back rooms and this was the ceiling there. The ceiling in the main part of the church was much more elaborate.
They have a Reid Sohn piano. I think it's Korean made by Samik. Not a bad piano.
Zimmerman piano with sharps that come unglued. I find Araldite is the best for this job. I take the key out to do it properly so I wouldn't recommend a non piano technician to try it. Araldite glues anything to anything. As most sharps these days are made of plastic it's the perfect adhesive for gluing plastic to wood. I've never had one come off after being reglued.
This is the oldest Kemble piano I have ever seen. Straight strung overdamper should put it atone of the first they made. I believe they were founded in 1911 so probably pretty close to then.
It's on its last legs. It has some loose tuning pins. I have replaced a few already. And also a tone flat.
Double booked for a piano tuning in a church hall. Managed to move the piano outside for tuning. Sometimes I need to improvise around tricky situations!
An old, quite worn out piano with a broken hammer butt. I took a hammer from the last note and replaced this one higher up. Luckily it fitted ok.
Old broadwood upright. I think it's probably over 100 years old. Needs quite a lot of work but I'm just replacing four broken strings and doing a little bit of regulation. The owner is thinking of buying a new piano soon so there is no point in doing too much work on this piano. It has very little value so it's not a good idea to spend money on it if it's going to be replaced.
Broken strings
Had to take the action out to get better access in order to replace the strings.
A new client of mine bought this Yamaha B2 for £500 from somewhere on the Internet. I think she said gumtree. This model has only been around for a few years so it must be quite new. They are around £3,200 brand new. The condition was perfect. It had hardly been played at all. I wish I could get these all the time for clients who ask me to help them buy used pianos!
This is the living room of a piano teacher who teaches piano teachers. He also has another two pianos in another room and a couple of keyboards!
The creme of quality pianos. Tuning a Bosendorfer grand today. It was bought second hand in the London piano auctions. It's about 10 years old. Needs a bit of attention now so I'm going back in a couple of weeks for some voicing and a bit of a mini service.
Bosendorfer distinctive pressure bar.
Tuned this piano the other day. Hasn't been done in 16 years since it was new. Client has now retired so has more time to play. Solid German piano with unusual veneer finish on the case. I have to go back soon to re-tune in order to get it at concert pitch.
Tuning a Boston grand today for a music festival. It's a nice piano which is hired out from a local shop for this music festival every year. They have these distinctive diamond holes in the iron frame. I've. been tuning it for several years now.
Unique diamond holes in the frame.
Bostons are made in Japan by Kawai I believe. Designed and sold by Steinway.
This piano has quite serious moth damage.
They eat the felt so you often get clicking sounds when playing as the felt stopping wood hitting wood has been eaten away.
I normally recommend these moth traps which can be placed on either side of the inside top of the piano. They seem to work pretty well.
I was hired by a london piano shop to tune and service is English grand. I was asked to do what I could in one day. After assessing the piano I started by first replacing 6 broken strings at the top.
Then I tuned the piano. It would need tuning twice as it was quite flat.
I took the action out and cleaned the soundboard and surrounding areas.
I faced the hammers and then removed the action from the keyboard.
I took all the keys out, cleaned everything and lubricated the key bushings. I also cleaned the ivories. Then I aligned all the hammers properly and carried out some regulation. I replaced the action. Finished cleaning the case of the piano. Then I carried out the final tuning.
The piano felt and sounded completely different after. I big transformation!
First job of the day in a church in central London. Yamaha C3 grand piano. Amazing building. Sometimes even local churches surprise me with how beautiful they can be.
I'm doing a bit of work for London Schimmel dealer Peregrine's pianos. Am hugely impressed by these new Schimmels. They are often very good.
Tuning 6 pianos today in a central London school plus one this morning in a hotel. 7 is normally my absolute limit for a day. It's handy that 6 of them are in the same place though. Much easier without the travelling.
Storage for musical stuff in piano practice room. Not much room for the piano tuner!
Beautiful hotel and restaurant in central London. I tuned their Yamaha disclavier this morning. For those of you who don't know a disclavier is Yamahas take on the old pianola system. It plays itself. Also it can record you playing and play it back to you exactly as you did. Plus - can also be played by another piano anywhere in the world through the Internet. They are pretty amazing. Some of them have speakers so the piano plays while the speakers play the other instruments.
Yamaha DU1 piano
