Monthly Archives: July 2014

A note about Fees

Just a quick note on my prices to clear things up:

I currently have an introductory offer of £40 for a first tuning. The standard price is always £50 regardless of how long it takes to tune the piano.

I’m primarily a piano tuner but there may be a small fee for repair jobs, especially if I have to replace any piano parts.

– Richard, Piano Tuner Sheffield.

Links page

I’ve just started working on a links page for this site. A Sheffield customer advised me to add one as she doesn’t have the time to search for appropriate books on the subject. It’s a work in a progress right now but the most informative piano restoration books I’ve read (I won’t bother to add books about piano tuning or becoming a piano tuner, if anyone is interested in becoming a piano tuner they’ll be able to find enough piano tuning advice at college) have been added, as well as some links to what I consider to be the most high-quality, top of the range piano manufacturers on the market.

Later on I’ll add more links for people who are thinking of taking up piano playing and need something cheap and basic. Cheap pianos are surprisingly easy to find and it’s amazing what some people are willing to give away for free.

Richard, Piano Tuner Sheffield

Links

In the future I will add a links page to this site. Not only for customers who might be interested, but for myself to keep track of the myriad websites that have helped me over the years.

I was talking to a customer in Sheffield yesterday and he was interested that the inside of the piano was more simple than he assumed. I agreed that is simple but that each repair job requires knowledge of how the action works and how the piano is put together. Many repair jobs are not actually very difficult when isolated (although some definitely are), but most of them require someone who has studied how a piano is constructed and usually only a piano tuner or piano technician will have studied this in depth.

 

I’ve read quite a few books on piano tuning and repairs, some good, some not so good. For the piano owner who would like a guide to help with simple and easily fixable problems that come up I would highly recommend the excellent ‘Piano Servicing, Tuning and Rebuilding: For the Professional, the Student and the Hobbyist’ by Arthur A. Reblitz:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Piano-Servicing-Tuning-Rebuilding-Professional/dp/1879511037/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1406049215&sr=8-1&keywords=Reblitz
I’d be lost without this book (as would many a piano tuner, student or professional). It’s the most comprehensive guide to piano tuning and piano repairs I’ve yet encountered and it covers most topics simply and without unnecessary jargon. The only problem is that it uses some american terminology (like most piano tuning/repair books), but with google you can find the translations.

I’m not saying people should always repair their pianos themselves. The role of the piano tuner and repairman should not be understated, but sometimes there are things can be fixed easily by the piano owner and a book like this is useful if you own a piano.

I’ll add more links if people think it would be helpful.

 

– Richard, Piano Tuner Sheffield.

A note on piano tuning devices/electronic piano tuners

When hiring a piano tuner, you may notice that he/she is carrying a piano tuning device, tools that are becoming increasingly popular with piano tuners as technology advances. This often causes confusion amongst the public as they tend to assume that these devices tune the piano for you and allow the piano tuner to coast through the job. Unfortunately for us, these are only tools that allow for even greater precision when tuning and there are still other parts of the job that take years of practice to master (such as setting the pins and tuning the unisons, not to mention all the repair jobs that come up unexpectedly). A qualified piano tuner will be able to tune accurately by ear but nobody is perfect and occasionally even an experienced professional will make subtle mistakes.

For the customer who thinks they could use a piano tuner device themselves to tune their own piano, I’m afraid the least expensive I’ve found cost £2,000. Even if you’ve got a good ear for music you will not be able to tune your own piano without working on the technique for several years, so until they invent a machine that can tune a piano automatically a professional piano tuner will always be needed.

 

– Richard, Piano Tuner Sheffield.