Music Trade Review

Issue: 1951 Vol. 110 N. 7

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
PRACTICAL PIANO TUNING
By ALEXANDER HART
Formerly with Steinway fir Sons Tuning Department, Instructor in
Piano Tuning, Teachers College, Columbia University, N. Y.
Registered Member of the
National Association of Piano Tuners
CHAPTER 31 - Piano Tuning in Review
Let's get along with a few more prob-
lems.
No. 58
Here is a note I found on a grand
piano: "The third A sticks; the fourth
has a double sound; hammer bounces;
fourth G # key has to be lifted; fifth
—No.
1 —
repeating action poor; seventh C
harsh sound."
Let us take them in their order.
The first thing was to remove the
action and see if everything was intact,
and no parts missing. Most of the
trouble was in the back checks. The
buckskin was split in half through con-
stant wear and stopped keys from re-
peating and falling properly. A few
hammers required shifting. The harsh
sound or tinniness was soon righted with
a little tone regulating.
At No. 14, Model 2, one can see the
spoon, and just above it is a piece of
felt on the lever. It happens through
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW, JULY, 1951
constant use the spoon wears the felt
away and leaves a small hole; conse-
quently, a prominent knocking sound is
heard. A new piece of felt fixes this
problem. The only difficulty is the
action must be removed.
I would suggest, whenever the action
is out of the case, always examine it
thoroughly before putting it back. The
same goes for when you are all finished
with the job.
Play a few chords, try the pedals,
examine for repetition, then check on
your tuning. Don't try to hear the im-
possible.
Check up on unisons. This procedure
is helpful in many ways. For instance,
a very good tuner may have worked
on the instrument only a short time.
So. stop, look and listen.
Don't start in and begin raising the
pitch at once, and alter the entire bal-
ance of the last tuner's art.
Try the temperament, and be quite
sure your tuning is up to par, because
it is better by far to let the pitch go
if only a fraction out of the way. The
inexperienced tuner may mean well by
this fractional alteration, but as I have
just remarked—be cautious and be able
to simplify the tuning instead of un-
doing nice work, which needs only
checking here and there.
How this is doen can be explained in
a few words.
No. 59
First try your A or C, then the octave
and note how far the A is from the above
A, then check the three A's. (Now check
the three C's and be sure they sound
fairly good, that is, that they harmonize
like one clear tone I. Clean up the uni-
sons by placing your felt wedge each
side of the three strings. If one is off,
right it. Then go from C down to A
flat. Should there be sufficient tremolo,
leave well enough alone.
One way to test this assurance is to
try C natural and A L below middle C,
then the octave above middle C—the A b
and G$: will sound sparkling as a tenth
tone from A 1 '. You must strike this
tenth harmonically, not melodically, to
obtain the desired effect. Once you
begin to hear these pronounced beats,
your temperament will have more life
to it.
To explain further, you can always
prove this desired effect by making the
major third pure, without beats, and
note the difference between the sound
of the tenth tone; you don't hear any
tremolo for the 10th and 3rd sound life-
less.
Now once more lower A b and observe
the desired result.
Unless there is a characteristic differ-
ence between major and minor thirds
and tenths and fourths, fifths and oc-
taves, the fine distinction in interval
relationships is lost.
Enharmonic comparison is found by
tuning major thirds, namely starting
on middle C, then octave below, then
to C, E, then to G^jt going upward,
F^jt to middle C, then to Octave E.
This test is, in the event you have
tuned all your fourths and fifths and
octaves absolutely perfect, no beats,
otherwise this practice will not be so
effective for the beginner.
Experienced tuners can start any-
where tempering as they go along. Of
course, this stunt takes lots of experience
and practice.
PLAYERS REBUILT
ACQUAINT YOUR PERSONNEL
with
ZEISS PRECISION TUNING CHARTS
Price $50.00 — A Must for Spinets
Zeiss Charts
Box 51
Brawley, Calif.
• Airmotors
• Bellows
Write:
• Pneumatics
• Rebuilt
TOLBERT F . CHEEK
11 Beauport Avenue , Gloucester, Mass.
21
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OBITUARIES
GEORGE A. SCOFIELD
George A. Scofield, Hartsdale, N.Y.,
president of the Pease-Behning Piano
Co. in New York for sixteen years until
1930, died on June 20th in White Plains
Hospital. He was 78 years old.
Born in Darien, Conn., he was a mem-
ber of the Columbia University class of
'93 and rowed on the university crew.
For seventeen years he was manager of
the Pease Piano Co. in New York and
later a sales manager of the Lord &
Taylor piano department until, in 1914,
he was named president of the Pease-
Behning firm. From 1930 until 1945
he was a salesman for the Baumer Pia-
no Co., New Rochelle.
A grandson of John Hecker, founder
of the flour-manufacturing firm, Mr.
Scofield was in 1917 vice president of
the New York Piano Merchants Asso-
ciation. He was a former vestryman
of Trinity Protestant Episcopal Church.
Mount Vernon.
A daughter, Mrs. Edward C. Muhl-
hausen of Hartsdale, survives.
OLIVER CALVIN KEENEY
Oliver Calvin Keeney. 74. piano tuner
of the Baltimore-Annapolis, Md. area,
died of cerebral hemorrhage June 13th.
Mr. Keeney who was blind since birth,
was born Nov. 22 1876, in Granite, Md.
He studied at the Maryland School for
the Blind, excelling in music and litera-
ture.
He was employed in the old Balti-
more plant of Wm. Knabe Co. for 33
years.
Hon. Theodore R. Me Keldin, Gover-
nor of Maryland was his newsboy in
those old Knabe days for many years.
Recently Mr. Keeney tuned his piano
in the State Mansion and at that time
was invited to play for the Governor.
During the past 20 years Mr. Keeney
helped found and develop Keeney's Pia-
no & Music Store of Annapolis, Md.
He is survived by his wife, Mrs. Al-
verta May Keeney and five sons, Donald
Oliver Keeney of Annapolis. Theodore
R. Keeney and Calvin A. Keeney of
Baltimore. Kenneth W. Keeney of Green-
belt, Wilbur C. Keeney of Baltimore,
one sister, Mrs. Gertrude L. Eyler of
Woodsboro, Md. and a half brother.
Louis M. Scible of Baltimore.
Mr. Keeney was buried Saturday.
June 16th, 1951 in Glen Haven Memori-
al Park at Glen Burnie. Md.
HERMAN F. STVBBE
Funeral services were held July 6 for
Herman F. Stubbe, 77, who passed
away July 4th at his home, 293 Washing-
ton Avenue. Roosevelt, L. I., New York.
He is survived by his wife Anna and
four daughters, Mrs. Belle Gossett, Mrs.
Jeanne De Boer, Mrs. Evelyn Chaiko.
Mrs. Maxine Emeigh and two sons Her-
man and Edwin, also sixteen grand-
children and two great grandchildren.
Many relatives and friends including
sixteen members of the American Society
of Piano Tuners and Technicians paid
Now Available . . .
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AMERICAN PIANO SUPPLY CO.
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6 WEST 20 STREET
22
Since 1848
NEW YORK 3, N. Y.
their last respects at his late residence.
Mr. Stubbe was a past vice-president of
the New York Society.
Mr. Stubbe learned piano repairing
and tuning in Berlin. Germany, coming
to New York in 1898. He first settled
in Glendale, Queens and worked for the
Walters Piano Co. Later he spent 15
years with the Rudolph Wurlitzer Co..
as field representative servicing orches-
trians and nickelodeons in the New
England area. After leaving Wurlit-
zer's, he opened a piano store in Brook-
lyn for sales, repairing and teaching of
piano. In 1910 he moved to his late
address where he conducted a tuning
and repairing service of pianos for
the Long Island area. This organiza-
tion later became known as the Long
Island Piano Co. Two of his surviving
children, Herman M. Stubbe and Jeanne
De Boer are now active in the piano
servicing field and are members of the
New York branch of the American
Societv of Piano Tuners & Technicians.
Tells How Zeiss Tuning
(harts Can Help Tuners
M. D. Howard. Box 51. Brawley, Calif,
is merchandising a Zeiss Precision Tun-
ing Chart which he claims can be of
great help to tuners when working on
spinet pianos.
"It is not news to those connected
with the music trades." said Mr. How-
ard recently that with the advent of
the small piano, the tuning problem
has been magnified somewhat, and
many of you know that before that
time, precision in the art was some-
times at a premium. These charts are
a hand down from a master craftsman
and were developed over a period of
years, being set down from actual prac-
tice ( not theory ). After attending a
tuners' convention in New York and
later visiting many dealers in remote
areas where the tuning problem is often
an unsolved one, one is led to the conclu-
sion that publication of these charts
would be a real boon to the industry
as well as the art. if they could be
generally adopted. They represent typi-
cal German thoroughness and produce
a high degree of precision without fail.
One chart in particular is advised
where unusual difficulties are encoun-
tered such as Short Strings,—Radical
alteration of pitch—Exceedingly tight
tuning pins—Possible instability of
frame. In fact they fill a very definite
need and are to be sold at a price com-
mensurate with their real value. There
is a preamble of about 3000 words on
Equal Temperament.
THE MUSI.C TRADE REVIEW, JULY, 1951

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