Handmade by Royal Appointment - Steinway & Sons BBC 4

[mercia]

"Toning" ... things like pin pricks in the hammer felt to soften it, so the sound gains bloom, etc etc... Piano toning is as much an art as piano tuning, I think...

thank you. I enjoyed the programme, knowing nothing on the subject. It shows why they are so expensive when you see the man-hours put into each instrument (+ materials of course)

[Richard Tarleton]

"Toning" ... things like pin pricks in the hammer felt to soften it, so the sound gains bloom, etc etc... Piano toning is as much an art as piano tuning, I think...

Also known as voicing??

[Nick Armstrong]

Also known as voicing??

I think so. My piano was tuned for some time in his earlier years by this wonderful guy Uli (he was a friend of a friend) and I learned the word 'toning' from him - perhaps it's a Germanic form, and 'voicing' is the more traditional English word for it...

[Richard Tarleton]

An amusing story in Alan Rusbridger's entertaining memoir "Play It Again". The Rusbridgers had Alfred Brendel round to dinner (as you do ), Brendel tried AR's Fazioli, decided it needed voicing, sent his piano technician Peter Salisbury round who did the business and spoke about voicing pianos for Brendel. Some months later AR found himself talking to Daniel Barenboim (), and told him about the Fazioli, Brendel's visit and Peter's work on the piano. '[Barenboim] started rolling his eyes. "Alfred is so prescriptive about pianos. He's a great, great pianist, a towering intellect and a wonderful humanist. But he f**ks up pianos!" He looked quite aghast that anyone would voluntarily entrust their piano to the tender mercies of Alfred Brendel'

[gradus]

Every now and then our elderly Bluthner is 'toned' by our tuner Ron and emerges all the better for it. I imagine any piano used in teaching will benefit similarly.

[Pianorak]

Every now and then our elderly Bluthner is 'toned' by our tuner Ron . . .

Interesting. My piano tuner referred me to a piano technician when I mentioned my Steinway could do with some attention, including "voicing". (I've never heard of "toning"). I know Steinway always send a piano technician to carry out work on the "action".

[ardcarp]

but I do wonder why so many people like to knock Lang Lang off his pedestal.

So do I. He is a fantastic pianist and has many followers amongst the young...which can only be a good thing.
(We're talking about Lang Lang, by the way.)

I would like to have known what the technician working on LL's piano at the Albert Hall did when LL remarked that the piano sounded "dry" from Middle C upwards. He assured LL that he could do something about it - what would that have been I wonder ?

I think at that point he was talking to sound engineers. Some amplification was being used, I think.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Our previous tuner was unhappy when we bought a Steinway - he thought they were harder to tune. However, he set to work on it and apparently did a good job. After he'd left, we discovered a deep gash in the polyester finish.

We called him back later in the day but he denied any negligence even though the damage could only have occurred during the time when the lid had been removed for tuning. SInce then, we've employed the north of England Steinway tuner/technician from Liverpool.

[VodkaDilc]

I wish I'd seen this. I hope it's being repeated sometime (don't BBC4 programmes get repeated during the week). Otherwise I might have to resort to the i-thing. I have fond memories of visiting the restoration department in the Marylebone Lane basement when they had my piano there for a few months. There seems to be some concern that they have been a bit slow in training up technicians to take the place of the generation nearing retirement; I'm not sure if that was mentioned in the programme.

[oddoneout]

There seems to be some concern that they have been a bit slow in training up technicians to take the place of the generation nearing retirement; I'm not sure if that was mentioned in the programme.

I imagine they have the same problem with lack of suitable applicants that so many other 'traditional' and /or craft based companies face, and it's not the sort of thing that lends itself to quick online course based qualification and subsequent big bucks pay-wise.

[BBMmk2]

Another dying craft?

[oddoneout]

Another dying craft?

It's a bit of a catch22 situation - if the menders and fettlers aren't available to service the instruments and work with the players then alternatives to the 'analog' piano become ever more likely to replace them, so making it more difficult to persuade new blood in?

[BBMmk2]

I think your right, oddoneout.