Georgepianoforte.com
Tune and Repair your Piano
A complex instrument, the piano contains some ten thousand unique parts. Many of these parts are quite delicate, and need much more servicing than most people realise. To maintain your piano in top condition, you should attend to its servicing with the same kind of diligence and thoroughness that you would with any other major purchase, such as a car. After all, your piano probably cost nearly as much as your car! We suggest that you create a maintenance schedule to keep you piano in good shape.
What is Tuning?
There are more than two hundred strings in a piano are stretched at high tension across a cast-iron frame, one end of each string, being attached to a hitch pin and the other end coiled around a tuning pin. The pitch of each string when vibrating depends, among other things, on the tension at which it's stretched. By turning the tuning pin, the tension can be tightened or slackened, and thus the pitch altered, according to the wishes of the tuner, who performs this operation with a special kind of socket wrench confusingly called a "tuning hammer".
Tuning, then means adjusting the tension of each of the piano strings, using a tuning hammer to turn the tuning pins, so that the pitch of each string sounds pleasingly in harmony with every other string according to certain known acoustical laws and aesthetic rules and customs. Note that whereas most tuners are also capable of providing other kinds of piano maintenance, tuning, properly speaking, is only the operation defined above, and does not include repairs and adjustments, fixing squeaky pedals, cleaning, and so on, as is often thought to be the case.
There are more than two hundred strings in a piano are stretched at high tension across a cast-iron frame, one end of each string, being attached to a hitch pin and the other end coiled around a tuning pin. The pitch of each string when vibrating depends, among other things, on the tension at which it's stretched. By turning the tuning pin, the tension can be tightened or slackened, and thus the pitch altered, according to the wishes of the tuner, who performs this operation with a special kind of socket wrench confusingly called a "tuning hammer".
Tuning, then means adjusting the tension of each of the piano strings, using a tuning hammer to turn the tuning pins, so that the pitch of each string sounds pleasingly in harmony with every other string according to certain known acoustical laws and aesthetic rules and customs. Note that whereas most tuners are also capable of providing other kinds of piano maintenance, tuning, properly speaking, is only the operation defined above, and does not include repairs and adjustments, fixing squeaky pedals, cleaning, and so on, as is often thought to be the case.
How Often and When Should I Have My Piano Tuned?
When to tune your piano obviously depends on your local climate and how responsive your piano is to humidity changes. But, in general, you should avoid times of rapid humidity change and seek times when the humidity will be stable for a reasonable length of time. Turning the heat on in the house in the fall and winter, and then off again in the spring, both cause major indoor humidity changes, and in each case it make take several months before the piano soundboard fully stabilizes again at the new humidity level.
If you have the piano tuned four or more times a year, you don't have to worry too much about the "right" time to tune it. Any seasonal tuning changes will be corrected soon enough. It's those who tune their pianos twice a year who have a problem. For these people, there will be at least two times per year when the piano is noticeably out of tune but when it will not yet be the right time to tune it. If you are in this group, you will have to decide then whether to go ahead and have it tuned—knowing it may go out of tune within a month or so;or to suffer until the "right" time. At those times of year, I try to inform customers who call for a tuning about the consequences of having the piano tuned then, and let them decide how badly they want it done.
There is an additional problem for the twice-a-year people. The times of rapid humidity change—spring and fall—are also the times of most moderate indoor humidity levels, while the times of stable humidity—summer and winter—are the times of most extreme humidity levels. The pitch of the middle range of the piano follows the humidity changes and is therefore most sharp and flat at the "recommended" tuning times. Pianos tuned at these times may have to undergo large pitch changes to bring them back to standard pitch. As any tuner can tell you, large pitch changes are the bane of stable tuning, as structural forces within the piano tend to make a piano tuning creep back in the direction from which it was moved. Pianos showing large seasonal pitch variations may require extra tuning work, at greater expense, and may not stay in tune as well. Thus, ironically, the tuning times recommended in response to climatic factors are the least recommended times in relation to structural stability, and vice versa. Unfortunately, there is no solution to this problem except to have the piano tuned more often.
If you tune the piano only once a year, you should do it at the same time each year so the tuner will not have to make much pitch adjustment. Some pianos actually go back into almost perfect tune each year around the anniversary of their tuning (but don't count on this happening).
How often you have the piano tuned will depend on only on the piano and the humidity inside your house, but also on your ear (how much out-of-tune-ness you notice and can tolerate) and on your budget. Four times a year is ideal, but impractical for most folks. The "official line" is twice a year. Where the piano is rarely used, once a year may suffice, but less than that is not recommended.
You may legitimately ask how important it is to have a piano tuned; that is, will harm be done to the instrument if it isn't tuned? This is a subject piano technicians don't discuss much. When they do, they offer a variety of pseudoscientific explanations to convince their customers (or themselves) of the necessity for tuning. The truth, as I see it, is that in most cases no harm will be done to the piano. The harm is mostly to one's aesthetics—an out-of-tune piano can be painful to listen to. It can also be discouraging and distracting to a student. It may be impossible to play along with other instruments or with recordings, and the piano's tonal quality may be impaired.
In the extreme case where a piano is being tuned after, say, twenty years of neglect, raising the pitch of the piano back to standard pitch will entail a good deal of extra work and could result in some broken strings or split bridges, but I'm not convinced that these problems would not have occurred anyway, and possibly sooner, if the piano had been maintained. Raising the pitch of a piano can also alter the positions of the strings in relation to their bearing points, introducing tonal irregularities (false beats) and buzzing strings, but this can often be corrected, and in any case is not what I would call "harmful". Suggestions that the piano will be structurally harmed if it is not precisely at standard pitch and in tune are, in my opinion, spurious. Having the piano serviced at regular intervals, however, may allow the technician to catch and correct small, non-tuning-related problems before they become big, expensive ones.
There is an additional problem for the twice-a-year people. The times of rapid humidity change—spring and fall—are also the times of most moderate indoor humidity levels, while the times of stable humidity—summer and winter—are the times of most extreme humidity levels. The pitch of the middle range of the piano follows the humidity changes and is therefore most sharp and flat at the "recommended" tuning times. Pianos tuned at these times may have to undergo large pitch changes to bring them back to standard pitch. As any tuner can tell you, large pitch changes are the bane of stable tuning, as structural forces within the piano tend to make a piano tuning creep back in the direction from which it was moved. Pianos showing large seasonal pitch variations may require extra tuning work, at greater expense, and may not stay in tune as well. Thus, ironically, the tuning times recommended in response to climatic factors are the least recommended times in relation to structural stability, and vice versa. Unfortunately, there is no solution to this problem except to have the piano tuned more often.
If you tune the piano only once a year, you should do it at the same time each year so the tuner will not have to make much pitch adjustment. Some pianos actually go back into almost perfect tune each year around the anniversary of their tuning (but don't count on this happening).
How often you have the piano tuned will depend on only on the piano and the humidity inside your house, but also on your ear (how much out-of-tune-ness you notice and can tolerate) and on your budget. Four times a year is ideal, but impractical for most folks. The "official line" is twice a year. Where the piano is rarely used, once a year may suffice, but less than that is not recommended.
You may legitimately ask how important it is to have a piano tuned; that is, will harm be done to the instrument if it isn't tuned? This is a subject piano technicians don't discuss much. When they do, they offer a variety of pseudoscientific explanations to convince their customers (or themselves) of the necessity for tuning. The truth, as I see it, is that in most cases no harm will be done to the piano. The harm is mostly to one's aesthetics—an out-of-tune piano can be painful to listen to. It can also be discouraging and distracting to a student. It may be impossible to play along with other instruments or with recordings, and the piano's tonal quality may be impaired.
In the extreme case where a piano is being tuned after, say, twenty years of neglect, raising the pitch of the piano back to standard pitch will entail a good deal of extra work and could result in some broken strings or split bridges, but I'm not convinced that these problems would not have occurred anyway, and possibly sooner, if the piano had been maintained. Raising the pitch of a piano can also alter the positions of the strings in relation to their bearing points, introducing tonal irregularities (false beats) and buzzing strings, but this can often be corrected, and in any case is not what I would call "harmful". Suggestions that the piano will be structurally harmed if it is not precisely at standard pitch and in tune are, in my opinion, spurious. Having the piano serviced at regular intervals, however, may allow the technician to catch and correct small, non-tuning-related problems before they become big, expensive ones.
