ORANGE COUNTY CHAPTER
September Meeting: (4th Monday)
Date: Monday, September 25, 2017
Time:
6:30 pm Food
7:00 pm Meeting
Location: Kim's Piano
10200 Beach Blvd.,
Stanton
Greetings to all Southern California piano technicians and readers of the PTG Southern California Newsletter.
Last month we were privileged to have John Patton, Vice President of Steinway and President of Boston and Essex Operations in for our monthly meeting. John has been working with Steinway since 1998 and has most recently spent several years working with Steinway in Asia. China is currently at peak production of pianos in terms of numbers. There is a huge interest in piano playing in China, and there are now about 35 million children taking piano lessons there. John's presentation began with reasons why new pianos are designed. He continued with a history of Boston and Essex and how their design tried to emulate Steinway as much as possible, including utilizing the same action geometry. He discussed the interesting relationship between Boston and Kawai, as well the relationship between Essex and the suppliers of its source materials. The latest updates on Boston and Essex pianos were covered, as continuous improvements are being made for each of the piano lines.
Also, David Vanderlip gave us a 5-minute technical on split mute techniques. A split mute can be made by cutting a slit up the center of a regular felt mute. This kind of mute works especially well with Cybertuner, substituting where two mutes would otherwise be used. For example, it can be used to mute the outside strings of a trichord.
This month David Reed will be presenting his tool modification class. A common frustration of piano technicians is that the tools we buy from the supply houses don't always do their jobs that well. In many cases, the tools work much better if they are modified or customized for their specific uses. David will show examples of modified tools and teach how to modify them. He will also show you how to make your own tools.
Hope to see you there!