Los Angeles Chapter
August Meeting: (3rd Monday)
Date: Monday, August 19, 2019
Time 6:00 pm
- Light dinner
7:00 pm - Meeting
Location: Hollywood Pianos
323 S.
Front St., Burbank, CA
(818) 954-8500
The 62nd Annual PTG Convention in Tucson was one of the best conventions ever. Incredible hotel, great classes, wonderful entertainment, and warm fraternity. All the ingredients for a successful convention. The 2020 convention will be in Orlando, FL, July 29 -Aug 1 and 2021 will be in Reno (Sparks) NV, July 14-17.
Nick Gravagne was awarded the Golden Hammer with a beautiful hammer atop a geode designed by Nate Reyburn.
Congratulations to our new RPTs in our chapter – Yoshi May (passed her exams at the convention), Adrian Carcione, Scott Reitz, Eric Rautenberg
We also have new PTG Officers -
Paul Adams, President
Marc Poulin, Vice
President
Jim Farris, Secretary Treasurer
David Stoneman from the Orange County Chapter is our new Western Regional VP. Yay!
The Council Meeting this year showed our new governance at work in its early stages. There will no longer be an Associate designation. Everyone will be a member of PTG with the Registered Piano Technicians still the only ones who will be referred for technical services.
As far as the controversial Steinway Decal Policy, only about 30% of the chapters and less than 20% of the members responded to the PTG survey. Although most agreed that the issue was of importance to our members and we would like PTG to attempt a dialogue with Steinway, it has been determined the PTG, as a non-profit entity, cannot allow further discussion of legal actions, boycotts or similar anti-trust violations in any form.
On a lighter note, Ned Klein, RPT has written a book about his adventures as a piano tuner. It is called Piano Dance and, of course, it is available through the great omni-market, the internet. There are several books written about piano tuners but few, if any, were written by a piano tuner. Even though you may think you can predict what this book will cover since you are a piano tuner it is his personal experiences that make it interesting and the way he communicates. For example, in the story about losing his girlfriend after a fox pass involving her parent's piano you can feel his chagrin and loss. (You will notice my misspelling of faux pas due to my deficiency in French.) Fortunately, Ned doesn't have such deficiencies and his book is very well written. He has met and worked for some high-end celebrities and these stories are always a great insight into the demeanor of artists. Buy it, read it and talk about it at the next meeting.
Join us this month for Mark Greisen's aural tuning the temperament of the mid-range.