Why was this so much fun to watch? You’re so entertaining, your personality shines through and makes this video great! A nice little interlude between pieces!
“This piano is 92 years old” cuz instruments are quality! I’ve seen sooo many pianos in such bad condition, but I will take almost any piano over any digital keyboard any day! Real pianos have so much personality!
Agreed. I have an 110 year old kimball, and in college i picked up a keyboard cause it was cheap and I could keep it in my apartment without pissing off neighbors. Now that I have both in my house I almost NEVER touch the keyboard, I love playing that old ass piano so much.
Not really, I’ve played digital keyboards for many years and I can tell you, crappy pianos really aren’t worth your time and money. You like real pianos probably because you are used to the out of tune sounds, hence the “personality”, it’s really just, out of tune. I’m not saying acoustic pianos are bad, just saying old pianos, or pianos not maintained regularly, are worse than most digital pianos.
Brian Smith - and before electricity was harnessed by Ben Franklin, any piano would be better than a keyboard with zero power. So there. Have you ever been to Europe? People keep forgetting that everything humans ever achieved used to be done without electricity... 🙄
Kristen, you're an awesome pianist! You can be good at piano tuning & repair as well, if you want. It looks like you've got all the right tools now, so you just need to be patient & get used to it. It's not uncommon to have to tune an old piano numerous times if hasn't been tuned for a long time. I'm surprised that "piano tuner" didn't mention that. You have to do a couple of "pitch raises" before you can fine-tune it. Just go across and "rough" in all the notes two or three times. After you've gotten them all very close, you can do your final fine-tuning on all of the strings. I would recommend getting a second opinion the condition of the piano. It may not be on its "last leg". If your piano tuner is not a repairman that may be why he said that. Also, a hammer is pretty easy to fix. Let me know if you have any questions about it. I'm a repairman in Illinois. I'd be happy to share tips and advice with you. If you can learn to like it, tuning & repairing pianos is a good job. If it interests you at all you could have 3 jobs, all involving piano .. (playing, tuning & repairing) A thought to ponder.. Thanks for sharing. I always love your videos😍
There is a lot to learn about tuning. Part of it is getting the sense in your hand that allows you to set the string to the right tension across its full length. The string can hang up a bit on the nuts and the bridge, and overcoming that is part of the job. Hammering loudly on the key tends to get rid of some of the problem. Sometimes the pins are too loose to hold a tuning, and at that point you have the choice of replacing pins (and possibly even replacing a cracked pin block) or else using "pin tightener" liquid. If you go to using pin tightener you'll need a piano tilter to do it right. Point gravity the right direction so that the stuff flows down the pin into the wood. If you don't have a tilter, three strong men can tilt an upright safely. One strong idiot can do it unsafely. Pin tightener is a religious matter. Some techs won't touch it, and will preach to you about why it does not even work. Google for piano tilter and you'll find info on how to use finger glue as pin tightener. To get a better sound you may need to voice the hammers, or even install a full set of new hammers and voice those. All these piano tech details are best left, say some people, to experts. But how did they get to be experts? Yes, of course, doing just what you are trying!
I wouldn't worry too much. Being able to play a piano like you can is a much grander accomplishment than learning how to tune one. It's like the difference between writing like a genius and repairing a typewriter. I discovered your channel a couple of months ago when I was looking for some good ragtime on the web. Glad I did.
Your musicianship skills are at such an amazing level, that you make both pianos sound amazing. Being a musician and also a wind player, your phrasing is so spot on, that it covers up many of the intonation issues of the older piano. One of my favorite poems is " The Touch of the Master's Hand.". Although the musician in the poem is a violinist, the idea, and ideals are very much the same:. You are a master, and really know how to bring out the best of any particular instrument that you happen to be playing.
As a certified piano tuner, I had to make a difficult choice when I was still learning to tune the piano. My teachers went with a simple rule of thumb: a great piano player is usually a bad tuner, and a great piano tuner usually is a bad piano player. Ofcourse it’s not always the case. But to make my point, tuning a piano isn’t as easy as it looks :) Please keep playing, I just love your arrangements :)
I have perfect pitch, so when I bought my apartment back in 1989 and it came with a piano, I watched carefully when the piano tuner came to tune it so I could learn how to maintain it after that. It hadn't been tuned in a while, so many of the upper notes went slightly out of tune in a few weeks. I bought a tuning wrench which was all I needed to "fine-tune" it, so to speak. My piano is a spinet so it has only 2 strings for the higher notes and 1 string for the lower notes, making it a lot easier to tune than a typical piano. When I resumed playing the piano in 2018 after 14 years of not playing, I had to do a lot what you did in the video clip, starting with cleaning off a lot of dust. Then it time to tune several of the higher notes. With only the tuning wrench, it took some time but I got it working again. Every few months, I have to clear off the top of the piano and tweak a few strings before I begin a practice session. It's a minor annoyance but it beats playing the piano with too many bad sounding notes.
Great job having a go at it! You did better than I would have, I don't have that level of patience. Keep your tuning kit. It's useful if a string or unison goes wonky on your main piano between tunings. Or if you have a gig and one note is just acting up.
Piano tuning is fun. There is a learning curve to get the right result. Notes need to be stretched up from the middle octave and down from the Middle octave. It is cool to hear you attempt to tune it. It takes time to get it. I tune for a living. There are still times that I struggle on some pianos because of string harmonics being weird sometimes.
I know the feeling. It took a couple tries before coming up with a system that worked for me. Now I can get it done in about 2.5 hours. Don’t give up!!! You got this👍🏽
One of my good friends has been a piano tuner since high school (coming upon 20 years now). The most impressive part is he can do it by ear. He makes it look so easy.
I am a recording engineer, Classical Music, mostly chamber music, quartets and piano trios. I have worked around many piano tuners over the years, and mostly they say it takes 3-5 years to become "Competent" and much longer to become totally professional. It is not just using the frequency plots, a lot of it is "feel". You did well girl considering it was a dead piano! Don't give up... Keep at it, anyone that has learned to play as well as you do will get there! Love your music!
Piano tuning is a dark art. My piano tuner doesn't use any electrical gadgets to tune the piano. He does it all by ear and it sounds great after he's finished with it. By the way, some pianos still sound great after 100 years. It all depends on the quality of the piano and how well it's been cared for.
Sounds good to me, I think you did a great job. Your normal piano just sounds younger, less depressed and brighter and happier, but the old piano does still sound pretty good thanks to you.
Thanks for sharing that adventure :) That piano probably needs tons of regulation in addition to tuning. The high notes are "too high" probably because they haven't lost their tuning as much. For normal piano tuning the low bass notes are tuned flatter and high treble notes are tuned higher than ideal. Look up the Railsback curve. Tuning all 3 strings well to each other is a challenge most don't expect until they try it themselves
Makes me feel a lot better about my first, and so far only, attempt at tuning a piano. I too inherited a piano of the same age (1928 Werner), and wanted to see if it would hold tune at all before I paid a professional to do it. My tuning took about four hours and I did manage to get most of it in tune. I’m currently in the process of refinishing it. Once the outside looks pretty, I’ll tune it myself again.
Zizanie - Bonjour! I just read your comment in my best French accent and it made me really happy! Also I am a pianist on TH-cam (and I don’t even have 100 subscribers!)
Mine sat for many years without a tuning and after the tuner broke two strings trying to bring it back, I agreed to a half step off tuning. Seemed like best compromise for less than stellar piano and sounded fine. If the kid learns half as much as you have, he’ll be great!
I've recently learned about tuning pianos with my parents' 80-year old Gulbransen. I needed more time with it. You seem to have it down, and once you're out of the C4-B6 area it's only one string to tune and it can be a lot less work. Good for you for getting to know your instrument a little better!
@@amazing7633 Agreed. With mine being ~80 years old it definitely needs more than just some tuning - mine needs the felting redone in the keyboard especially around C2-C3.
That piano is my mother's age!:) My grandmother had an even older Kimball upright that was a half-tone flat. It drove me crazy because I know what middle C, relative to A-440, is supposed to sound like. The temperament strip is used to bring the octave around Middle C up to snuff. It mutes two of each of the three strings in each unison. Once you set your temperament, it's a matter of pulling in the rest of the unisons. I can tune a piano in two hours, provided it was on pitch to begin with.
I once spent all weekend at a friend's place tuning his piano. He had a tuning hammer, but no mutes, so we went out on Friday evening trying to find a strip of felt in the small town he lived in to use as a mute (exciting Friday night of 2 engineers who are also musicians - tracking down a strip of felt to tun a piano). It was the same thing, it went out of tune again in a few days. Old pianos with dried out pegboards just won't stay in tune - the pegboard shrinks, so the holes are too big, and the pegs won't stay where you leave them. I think there is a little bit of technique required even on a good piano, just like when you turn the pegs on a violin, but it's harder to be pushing the peg in on a piano while you're tuning it, so instead you always try to get the string it tune by tightening the string. If you overshoot, go under, and back up to it. You can use a strip of felt to mute the 2 outside strings on all the notes at once, then tune all the middle strings, then as you remove the felt on one note at time, get the unisons all right. It was kindof a waste of time, but also a fun weekend - the 3 or 4 octaves we managed to tune sounded pretty good for a few hours! There's usually a good reason a "free" piano is free... :)
People occasionally ask me the value of an old piano. I say, "It's usually a $50 piano." They'll complain, "I would think it would be worth a lot more than that." "Well," I tell them, "it's worse than you think. Perhaps you can find someone to pay you $50 for it. Or perhaps you'll have to pay $50 to get rid of it." 30 or 40 years ago I paid to have a 1928 Brewster player piano rebuilt. It sounded strident but good. Now it's due for another rebuild, but so am I.
The problem with older pianos is the tuning pegs lose tension after a long time of not being tuned. This means when you go to tune the piano often the pegs will revert to their original position. Also the note that plays twice is most likely due to a loose hammer flange
I think you did a good job, tuning anything can be a pain if the tuners aren't working with you. That whole hammer issue means it needs re-alignment, so that means you are taking the front or back face off (depends on the brand) and trying access the linkages. Still think it was a good video, I've played forever and can't use half the techniques you do. Very impressed. Best
Kristen!!! Yay so happy to see a new video!!! I have never attempted to tune a piano... “you get to watch me struggle” lol story of my life! Love your sass soooo relatable!!! It’s like hello world, welcome to any musician’s life!
I started tuning my own piano after buying a kit online, and now I offer the service for only $40/h! I believe in you! You should get an app that shows the frequency, and also match the number. It's much harder in the upper register to do by ear
You actually did fairly well considering the state of that piano -- strings, pin block (loose pins), hammers, etc. -- it was never going to get but so good ..
Don't be discouraged over tuning old pianos. Btw you are a fabulous piano player. Way better than myself, but I have a love for restoring old pianos, and what I've found is old oxidated, corroded strings (especially the lower, single strings) are almost un-tunable. I got a few in the "ballpark" and you just have to settle for that. I finally dedicated a free days to removing the string board off an old Wurlitzer, cutting the old strings off, and replacing them with new ones.. aaaand .. yeah. Really easy to tune.. and still easy to tune another necessary 12 times in 12 weeks lol, before winter lol..
If it makes you feel any better. I took a class in piano repair (tuning). They said it takes 3 - 4 years of 8 hours a day to get good at it. After 3 days, you are fantastic. Now, only 4 years 11 months and 27 days untl you graduate. :)
I also learned how to tune mine for Zoom lessons with my prof... I'll be trying to perfect the art for probably the next 5 decades... It's tricky! I just subscribed, and I noticed in a newer video (Quarantine Rag - nice by the way!) that your piano sounded tuned! This makes sense LOL. Happy tuning! Trial and error!
We had an antique piano at a resort I owned and the tuner said that, when they’re old enough, they don’t tend to hold the tune. They basically get “loose” so you can tighten the strings but they just loosen up again. Anyhow, I enjoy your videos. Perhaps you can tune a piano but can’t tuna fish. Dad jokes.
If its just few strings that loosen often they usually can fix individual tuning pins but once there are several and its not expensive make it may not be worth to fix.. When strings start to be over 60 years old one usually start to hear it too, had I like Steinway upright and were very rich I would change bass strings then.. I would rather buy 80s then midrange priced upright that has been tuned regularly than say 1920s very big Steinway upright with original strings that has been a decorative item over 10 years lol.. Such an instrument would require as many tunings as a brand new piano (3-4x) in the first year and sound would still not be excellent..
Not bad for your first attempt. A piano that has not been tuned regularly and has dropped significantly in pitch often needs a "pitch raise." The tuner gets it "in the ballpark," and then retunes to get everything on pitch. It will often need several tunings to stabilize. This of course assumes there aren't any underlying structural problems like loose tuning pins slipping, a cracked pin block, etc.
I'm having to tune my own as well, due to saving money and the whole idea of not inviting others into your home during a pandemic. Its been time consuming but worth it, and you need to have a good ear, as well as some interval training. Its probably best to not get it tuned during too dry or too humid weather, as the sound board will expand.
Hahah that was a funny video! Made my day ! I agree with the tuner. That piano is knackered. At that age without regular maintenance the strings get brittle, tuning pegs come loose so tuning it is a losing battle. The action is also completely annihilated too. I have a Steinway Grand that’s only 10 years old and in pretty much perfect condition so wouldn’t ever attempt at tuning it but wouldn’t mind a go at an older model at some point. Not an easy task. P.S I ....LOVE your German Shepherd dog. My fav breed ! Gorgeous.
You can easily tune it, its just skill you learn after few tries Try tuning one string on each note (I usually tune the middle one first using the red strip between each note) using the app (block the other strings) Tune a full octave with only one string on each note, once its tuned (one octave one string on each note) Tune/sync the others strings using your ears only (try to reduce the the ghosty sound as much as possible) by blocking one side string and tunning the other one (assuming the middle one is already tuned) After a while (about 10 times) you should be able to tune a full piano in 1.5 hours if you do it right the red strip you have is very useful to block multiple strings and keep the middle one clear Important note - once you learn how to tune it you will probably notice that your piano is never tuned and you will find yourself tunning few notes every few days :\ You play amazing really I like your videos good luck!
So just saying, as a female pianist who has been performing for a decade and a half, reading your comment section is hilarious because it’s sooo relatable! Like, sigh, I already answered that question. And that one. And I’ve heard that comment a million times... and also to answer your question, I think both sound good and I share your disgust about the quality of a “bad” piano. So many ppl tell me I sound amazing while I internally scream and cringe and rant about how horrible it is, and on a stage you can actually fake it until you make it big time. Anyway, I applaud you and all your ragtime arrangements and performances! From your California fan :)
I've been tuning mine for years with a quarter inch ratchet extension, vice grips, and slices of eraser. I just do it by ear until it's good enough for me. The piano is about one hundred years old.
Haha I have to chuckle. My aunt had 5 pianos in her house. One was a concert grand (Steinway) that took up the entire living room. She had an upright, console, baby grand anf a player piano. She could not read music, but yoy could hum a song, she could play it. She loved playing rag too. She had a piano tuner come in once every 3 mo to tune all of her pianos. It got very expensive so my uncle learned how to tune then himself. It was funny watching him tune them as my aunt had perfect pitch and Would yell at him "no! That's wrong!" One of the most important parts of a piano is the pin block that holds the pegs. If your piano goes out of tune often, the pin block may have to be replaced. And get a quality pin block too.
tuning a piano is a job, be patient , and protect your hears the man who was tuning my mom's piano (an erhard if i'm not wrong) had 2 tools, his keys and hears, i spent hours watching him, learning, and for sure listening!! But i'm sure you can do it!!
Oh yeah, thats why out there are piano-tuner :-) My brother and I have bought an old piano a couple of years ago, the previous owner had spend much money into it but now it is tuned a half note down because there is the fear, that the body can't hold the pressure of a 440hz tuning. And even if the tunerman was there, it wont hold long until the middle octaves are out-of-tune again. I have tried to fix that once, but no chance. Maybe I am no good player, but I can here it, if it sounds tuned. - But I love the look of that old thing with candle-holders.
I tried to tune my piano...and like you I bought a kit and set to. I got it in tune with itself in Bb - which actually wasn't too much of an issue as I play clarinet. the problem came when I snapped two strings. I desperately want to know how to replace them or get them replaced. I'd really like to work as a piano tuner...but I'm not great at playing.
I pretty much knew how this was going to turn out before watching (sorry) 😂. Don't be too hard on yourself. It's 92 years old and sounds like it would need a complete overhaul. The wooden board the pegs are on probably needs completely replacing and so that's why the notes were slipping from one day to the next. No way to tune a piano like that unless it's fixed first which can end up being seriously expensive. On a sidenote I remember being at school (too many years ago now to mention) and we had a piano tuner come in to tune the grand piano there and he was both blind and deaf! To say I was completely gobsmacked is putting it lightly. I've never heard a piano tuned so well before or after that tuner. Also to tune a piano I was told by a tuner years ago that using software Apps is not always great (depends on the App) as the bottom C (for instance) on a piano will (and should) actually be out of tune slightly with the top C and so on and so forth or you get an awful sound. It's definitely an art form which only certain people can do so don't be hard on yourself. Your playing is excellent and beautiful so you stick to that as that is a gift.
Lol I found this so funny, it took me 2 years to learn tuning at The City Of Leeds Collage Of Music( CLCM) I actually learnt tuning on a Kemble as one of the many pianos. All by ear as well no gadgets involved 😉
Had a similar expereince a month ago. Was using a random website and my laptops mic it took me a few days to get thru and i realized i had the wrong tuning wrench i called a tuner and he didnt think i fucked anything up but its so much harder than it seems ive been playing about 14 years too
Heeeyyy i had the same tuning kit in New Zealand lol its a good learning experience i did it on my own piano but what i did on mine I tuned it in 5ths i found it easier dunno how lol
Considering the piano was close to 100 years old and likely not one of Kimball's top of the line models to begin with, and that you had no experience or guidance in piano tuning, I think you did an excellent job. Bravo for stepping so far out of your comfort zone. Certainly ended better than my first attempt at woodworking.
You can’t use a standard chromatic tuner to tune a piano... Try Entropy or TuneLab. If you use very fine movements and tune it multiple times, eventually the tuning should hold.
I'm no pianist by any means, but I think you did a fine job with the old piano. It doesn't sound teeth-grinding horrid, at least to me. Love your renditions of all the piano classics that you play. well done!
Love the "Play Me" in the dust!🤣🤣🤣 But seriously, nice try on the job. You'd probably got farther than I would've. Love your music, makes me wonder what I'd sound like if I kept up with piano lessons.
I was only planning on watching a minute of this, but then I couldn't look away. From what little I've read on the subject, most unmaintained pianos that old are pretty much lost causes, so from the beginning it was like watching a train wreck. But nobody was going to get hurt. Good for you for giving it a try, I hope it was a bit of a learning experience anyway!
Hi Kristen, I listen to your ragtime piano o playing, I also play along with you on my 26 string rag time harp, very interesting You are really good, keep it up.
how old is your personal piano? also i know you could probably say i'm not the best at telling if a piano is out of tune but personally i thought the older piano didn't sound to bad lol. anyway have a good day everyone!
You've got some fancy gadgets for piano tuning. You should take your time and be patient with your mom's piano. Learn how to tune it up and get an understanding of the mechanics of the instrument, how it works, what does what and how. All you can do is grow from the experience.Good luck, I love hearing you play, you have a gift
I tried tuning a few pianos in the past because I had one lady who wanted to give her kids piano lessons but was too cheap to pay a professional tuner. Nightmare! She had two pianos. First was a very awful player piano. Second was a baby grand. Neither had been tuned for at least 30 years. She said, "It sounds good to me" BEFORE I tuned either one of them. I got the pianos to be in tune with themselves so that if you played them, you would actually recognize the song. That's about as far as my by-ear-with-a-single-A-440-tuning-fork-skill was going to bring either one of those pieces of junk. I told her, please get a pro in here. She never did. Most I'll do now is fix notes that drift on my 1935 Chickering Baby Grand. But yeah, when it's time for a real tuning, I hire a real tuner! Tuning is hard!!!!
Hi, nice vidieo. I never thought there was so much to tuning a piano and at the same time I wasn't aware that they could "wear out". Curious if new strings would help or just what the issue is. I too like the older "saloon sound". Gotta give it to your mom, the price was right!!
Pianos are made to last. All instruments are made to last. Can you imagine the tens of thousands of dollars musicians would have to spend if they had to replace anything in their instrument! A piano that’s under 100 years old will still sound good IF it is properly maintained and tuned annually. If a piano is NOT played on a regular basis, it will need to be tuned at least every 6 months.
I tune my own piano as well. It is an old Everett spinet from the early 1960s and requires more attention as the strings age. As strings age, they stretch and require more attention. Also, as strings age, they are more likely to break while tuning. I've replaced a few of those as well. The brass bridges shouldn't change, but pianos with wooden bridges suffer from expansion and contraction from humidity and temperature changes. Old pianos (especially uprights and spinets) often have wooden bridges in them, which makes tuning them impossible. I understand the sympathies of those who don't like digital pianos, but I play mine in church and on the mission field. It is always in tune and I laugh as my guitar buddies are stopping to retune every hour or so. No, it doesn't have the bright sound of the "real thing," but it is portable and always ready to go.
2 notes from one key has got to be a known problem, and probably simple to fix once you have figured out how to remove (and replace) a complete key mechanism.
The best race car drivers are not necessarily the best mechanics (especially without training). My tuner had a one year apprenticeship. Hotdogs didn't tune his pianos. Nice effort but I wouldn't give up on the old piano as long as sound board is whole, and harp isn't cracked - the rest can be fixed
Why was this so much fun to watch? You’re so entertaining, your personality shines through and makes this video great! A nice little interlude between pieces!
Your musicality comes out every time you play, regardless how in or out of tune the piano is! Keep up the good work!
“This piano is 92 years old” cuz instruments are quality! I’ve seen sooo many pianos in such bad condition, but I will take almost any piano over any digital keyboard any day! Real pianos have so much personality!
Agreed. I have an 110 year old kimball, and in college i picked up a keyboard cause it was cheap and I could keep it in my apartment without pissing off neighbors. Now that I have both in my house I almost NEVER touch the keyboard, I love playing that old ass piano so much.
Eh i disagree. A very good electric would be much better to learn to play piano on.
Not really, I’ve played digital keyboards for many years and I can tell you, crappy pianos really aren’t worth your time and money. You like real pianos probably because you are used to the out of tune sounds, hence the “personality”, it’s really just, out of tune. I’m not saying acoustic pianos are bad, just saying old pianos, or pianos not maintained regularly, are worse than most digital pianos.
Brian Smith - and before electricity was harnessed by Ben Franklin, any piano would be better than a keyboard with zero power. So there. Have you ever been to Europe? People keep forgetting that everything humans ever achieved used to be done without electricity... 🙄
@@tamalyncervin2117 Franklin didn't harness electricity. He discovered it. Edison, Tesla, and Westinghouse harnessed electricity.
Kristen, you're an awesome pianist! You can be good at piano tuning & repair as well, if you want. It looks like you've got all the right tools now, so you just need to be patient & get used to it. It's not uncommon to have to tune an old piano numerous times if hasn't been tuned for a long time. I'm surprised that "piano tuner" didn't mention that. You have to do a couple of "pitch raises" before you can fine-tune it. Just go across and "rough" in all the notes two or three times. After you've gotten them all very close, you can do your final fine-tuning on all of the strings. I would recommend getting a second opinion the condition of the piano. It may not be on its "last leg". If your piano tuner is not a repairman that may be why he said that. Also, a hammer is pretty easy to fix. Let me know if you have any questions about it. I'm a repairman in Illinois. I'd be happy to share tips and advice with you.
If you can learn to like it, tuning & repairing pianos is a good job. If it interests you at all you could have 3 jobs, all involving piano .. (playing, tuning & repairing) A thought to ponder..
Thanks for sharing. I always love your videos😍
Micheal Wildman, to speedup the tuning process you can turn the handle while the note is playing. You can see and hear when you crank too much.
There is a lot to learn about tuning. Part of it is getting the sense in your hand that allows you to set the string to the right tension across its full length. The string can hang up a bit on the nuts and the bridge, and overcoming that is part of the job. Hammering loudly on the key tends to get rid of some of the problem.
Sometimes the pins are too loose to hold a tuning, and at that point you have the choice of replacing pins (and possibly even replacing a cracked pin block) or else using "pin tightener" liquid. If you go to using pin tightener you'll need a piano tilter to do it right. Point gravity the right direction so that the stuff flows down the pin into the wood. If you don't have a tilter, three strong men can tilt an upright safely. One strong idiot can do it unsafely.
Pin tightener is a religious matter. Some techs won't touch it, and will preach to you about why it does not even work. Google for piano tilter and you'll find info on how to use finger glue as pin tightener.
To get a better sound you may need to voice the hammers, or even install a full set of new hammers and voice those.
All these piano tech details are best left, say some people, to experts. But how did they get to be experts? Yes, of course, doing just what you are trying!
amazing763 , did you mean for your comment to be for Kristen? I am an experienced, professional piano tuner & repairman.
Raimo Geel , you should send your comments regarding tuning techniques to Kristen. I already know how to tune pianos.
Micheal Wildman For a piano that sounds ‘dead’, does changing the strings help like it does on a guitar? Or is that more the condition of the felt?
I wouldn't worry too much. Being able to play a piano like you can is a much grander accomplishment than learning how to tune one. It's like the difference between writing like a genius and repairing a typewriter. I discovered your channel a couple of months ago when I was looking for some good ragtime on the web. Glad I did.
Your musicianship skills are at such an amazing level, that you make both pianos sound amazing. Being a musician and also a wind player, your phrasing is so spot on, that it covers up many of the intonation issues of the older piano. One of my favorite poems is " The Touch of the Master's Hand.". Although the musician in the poem is a violinist, the idea, and ideals are very much the same:. You are a master, and really know how to bring out the best of any particular instrument that you happen to be playing.
I love the phrase "whole-ass other note".
@ 1:20 lmao! 🤣🤣
As a certified piano tuner, I had to make a difficult choice when I was still learning to tune the piano. My teachers went with a simple rule of thumb: a great piano player is usually a bad tuner, and a great piano tuner usually is a bad piano player. Ofcourse it’s not always the case. But to make my point, tuning a piano isn’t as easy as it looks :) Please keep playing, I just love your arrangements :)
Your nephew dancing is flawlessly wholesome.
I have perfect pitch, so when I bought my apartment back in 1989 and it came with a piano, I watched carefully when the piano tuner came to tune it so I could learn how to maintain it after that. It hadn't been tuned in a while, so many of the upper notes went slightly out of tune in a few weeks. I bought a tuning wrench which was all I needed to "fine-tune" it, so to speak. My piano is a spinet so it has only 2 strings for the higher notes and 1 string for the lower notes, making it a lot easier to tune than a typical piano.
When I resumed playing the piano in 2018 after 14 years of not playing, I had to do a lot what you did in the video clip, starting with cleaning off a lot of dust. Then it time to tune several of the higher notes. With only the tuning wrench, it took some time but I got it working again. Every few months, I have to clear off the top of the piano and tweak a few strings before I begin a practice session. It's a minor annoyance but it beats playing the piano with too many bad sounding notes.
Great job having a go at it! You did better than I would have, I don't have that level of patience. Keep your tuning kit. It's useful if a string or unison goes wonky on your main piano between tunings. Or if you have a gig and one note is just acting up.
Piano tuning is fun. There is a learning curve to get the right result. Notes need to be stretched up from the middle octave and down from the Middle octave. It is cool to hear you attempt to tune it. It takes time to get it. I tune for a living. There are still times that I struggle on some pianos because of string harmonics being weird sometimes.
I know the feeling. It took a couple tries before coming up with a system that worked for me. Now I can get it done in about 2.5 hours. Don’t give up!!! You got this👍🏽
One of my good friends has been a piano tuner since high school (coming upon 20 years now). The most impressive part is he can do it by ear. He makes it look so easy.
I am a recording engineer, Classical Music, mostly chamber music, quartets and piano trios. I have worked around many piano tuners over the years, and mostly they say it takes 3-5 years to become "Competent" and much longer to become totally professional. It is not just using the frequency plots, a lot of it is "feel". You did well girl considering it was a dead piano! Don't give up... Keep at it, anyone that has learned to play as well as you do will get there! Love your music!
Piano tuning is a dark art. My piano tuner doesn't use any electrical gadgets to tune the piano. He does it all by ear and it sounds great after he's finished with it. By the way, some pianos still sound great after 100 years. It all depends on the quality of the piano and how well it's been cared for.
This one clearly was not cared for!
Sounds good to me, I think you did a great job. Your normal piano just sounds younger, less depressed and brighter and happier, but the old piano does still sound pretty good thanks to you.
Thanks for sharing that adventure :) That piano probably needs tons of regulation in addition to tuning. The high notes are "too high" probably because they haven't lost their tuning as much. For normal piano tuning the low bass notes are tuned flatter and high treble notes are tuned higher than ideal. Look up the Railsback curve. Tuning all 3 strings well to each other is a challenge most don't expect until they try it themselves
Makes me feel a lot better about my first, and so far only, attempt at tuning a piano. I too inherited a piano of the same age (1928 Werner), and wanted to see if it would hold tune at all before I paid a professional to do it. My tuning took about four hours and I did manage to get most of it in tune. I’m currently in the process of refinishing it. Once the outside looks pretty, I’ll tune it myself again.
Your"re terrific Kristen!
I'm listening to you from France and I can say that I love your videos, your music and your style ;)
Zizanie - Bonjour! I just read your comment in my best French accent and it made me really happy! Also I am a pianist on TH-cam (and I don’t even have 100 subscribers!)
I wonder how many lights got turned to white by this video
Mine sat for many years without a tuning and after the tuner broke two strings trying to bring it back, I agreed to a half step off tuning. Seemed like best compromise for less than stellar piano and sounded fine. If the kid learns half as much as you have, he’ll be great!
I've recently learned about tuning pianos with my parents' 80-year old Gulbransen. I needed more time with it. You seem to have it down, and once you're out of the C4-B6 area it's only one string to tune and it can be a lot less work.
Good for you for getting to know your instrument a little better!
My own Gully is a nice piano with a good sound, but it does need further rebuilding.
@@amazing7633 Agreed. With mine being ~80 years old it definitely needs more than just some tuning - mine needs the felting redone in the keyboard especially around C2-C3.
That piano is my mother's age!:) My grandmother had an even older Kimball upright that was a half-tone flat. It drove me crazy because I know what middle C, relative to A-440, is supposed to sound like. The temperament strip is used to bring the octave around Middle C up to snuff. It mutes two of each of the three strings in each unison. Once you set your temperament, it's a matter of pulling in the rest of the unisons. I can tune a piano in two hours, provided it was on pitch to begin with.
I once spent all weekend at a friend's place tuning his piano. He had a tuning hammer, but no mutes, so we went out on Friday evening trying to find a strip of felt in the small town he lived in to use as a mute (exciting Friday night of 2 engineers who are also musicians - tracking down a strip of felt to tun a piano). It was the same thing, it went out of tune again in a few days. Old pianos with dried out pegboards just won't stay in tune - the pegboard shrinks, so the holes are too big, and the pegs won't stay where you leave them. I think there is a little bit of technique required even on a good piano, just like when you turn the pegs on a violin, but it's harder to be pushing the peg in on a piano while you're tuning it, so instead you always try to get the string it tune by tightening the string. If you overshoot, go under, and back up to it. You can use a strip of felt to mute the 2 outside strings on all the notes at once, then tune all the middle strings, then as you remove the felt on one note at time, get the unisons all right. It was kindof a waste of time, but also a fun weekend - the 3 or 4 octaves we managed to tune sounded pretty good for a few hours! There's usually a good reason a "free" piano is free... :)
People occasionally ask me the value of an old piano. I say, "It's usually a $50 piano." They'll complain, "I would think it would be worth a lot more than that." "Well," I tell them, "it's worse than you think. Perhaps you can find someone to pay you $50 for it. Or perhaps you'll have to pay $50 to get rid of it." 30 or 40 years ago I paid to have a 1928 Brewster player piano rebuilt. It sounded strident but good. Now it's due for another rebuild, but so am I.
The problem with older pianos is the tuning pegs lose tension after a long time of not being tuned. This means when you go to tune the piano often the pegs will revert to their original position. Also the note that plays twice is most likely due to a loose hammer flange
This is just a simply wondrous post! You are learning a tremendous skill which will make you a better player. Your nephew is a treasure.
Omg I love that new/old piano. Cameron dancing is so cute!!
In case you didn’t know, old pianos that have been out of tune for many years usually require multiple tunings since the strings had slack.
I think you did a good job, tuning anything can be a pain if the tuners aren't working with you. That whole hammer issue means it needs re-alignment, so that means you are taking the front or back face off (depends on the brand) and trying access the linkages. Still think it was a good video, I've played forever and can't use half the techniques you do. Very impressed.
Best
Kristen!!! Yay so happy to see a new video!!! I have never attempted to tune a piano... “you get to watch me struggle” lol story of my life! Love your sass soooo relatable!!! It’s like hello world, welcome to any musician’s life!
I started tuning my own piano after buying a kit online, and now I offer the service for only $40/h! I believe in you! You should get an app that shows the frequency, and also match the number. It's much harder in the upper register to do by ear
You actually did fairly well considering the state of that piano -- strings, pin block (loose pins), hammers, etc. -- it was never going to get but so good ..
Don't be discouraged over tuning old pianos. Btw you are a fabulous piano player. Way better than myself, but I have a love for restoring old pianos, and what I've found is old oxidated, corroded strings (especially the lower, single strings) are almost un-tunable. I got a few in the "ballpark" and you just have to settle for that. I finally dedicated a free days to removing the string board off an old Wurlitzer, cutting the old strings off, and replacing them with new ones.. aaaand .. yeah. Really easy to tune.. and still easy to tune another necessary 12 times in 12 weeks lol, before winter lol..
If it makes you feel any better. I took a class in piano repair (tuning). They said it takes 3 - 4 years of 8 hours a day to get good at it. After 3 days, you are fantastic. Now, only 4 years 11 months and 27 days untl you graduate. :)
I also learned how to tune mine for Zoom lessons with my prof... I'll be trying to perfect the art for probably the next 5 decades... It's tricky! I just subscribed, and I noticed in a newer video (Quarantine Rag - nice by the way!) that your piano sounded tuned! This makes sense LOL. Happy tuning! Trial and error!
That was a really fun video. I enjoyed the segway to Cameron doing dance backup behind you.
Cool nephew-reveal. Hopefully he picks up your love of playing.
We had an antique piano at a resort I owned and the tuner said that, when they’re old enough, they don’t tend to hold the tune. They basically get “loose” so you can tighten the strings but they just loosen up again.
Anyhow, I enjoy your videos.
Perhaps you can tune a piano but can’t tuna fish. Dad jokes.
If its just few strings that loosen often they usually can fix individual tuning pins but once there are several and its not expensive make it may not be worth to fix.. When strings start to be over 60 years old one usually start to hear it too, had I like Steinway upright and were very rich I would change bass strings then.. I would rather buy 80s then midrange priced upright that has been tuned regularly than say 1920s very big Steinway upright with original strings that has been a decorative item over 10 years lol.. Such an instrument would require as many tunings as a brand new piano (3-4x) in the first year and sound would still not be excellent..
Not bad for your first attempt. A piano that has not been tuned regularly and has dropped significantly in pitch often needs a "pitch raise." The tuner gets it "in the ballpark," and then retunes to get everything on pitch. It will often need several tunings to stabilize. This of course assumes there aren't any underlying structural problems like loose tuning pins slipping, a cracked pin block, etc.
I'm having to tune my own as well, due to saving money and the whole idea of not inviting others into your home during a pandemic. Its been time consuming but worth it, and you need to have a good ear, as well as some interval training. Its probably best to not get it tuned during too dry or too humid weather, as the sound board will expand.
I use a soundboard from a piano as a headboard for a queen-sized bed. You can use other parts to make interesting things.
Sounds like you got it tuned pretty well! and that's coming from someone with perfect pitch
Hahah that was a funny video! Made my day !
I agree with the tuner. That piano is knackered. At that age without regular maintenance the strings get brittle, tuning pegs come loose so tuning it is a losing battle. The action is also completely annihilated too.
I have a Steinway Grand that’s only 10 years old and in pretty much perfect condition so wouldn’t ever attempt at tuning it but wouldn’t mind a go at an older model at some point. Not an easy task.
P.S I ....LOVE your German Shepherd dog. My fav breed ! Gorgeous.
You can easily tune it, its just skill you learn after few tries
Try tuning one string on each note (I usually tune the middle one first using the red strip between each note) using the app (block the other strings)
Tune a full octave with only one string on each note, once its tuned (one octave one string on each note)
Tune/sync the others strings using your ears only (try to reduce the the ghosty sound as much as possible) by blocking one side string and tunning the other one (assuming the middle one is already tuned)
After a while (about 10 times) you should be able to tune a full piano in 1.5 hours if you do it right
the red strip you have is very useful to block multiple strings and keep the middle one clear
Important note - once you learn how to tune it you will probably notice that your piano is never tuned and you will find yourself tunning few notes every few days :\
You play amazing really I like your videos
good luck!
So just saying, as a female pianist who has been performing for a decade and a half, reading your comment section is hilarious because it’s sooo relatable! Like, sigh, I already answered that question. And that one. And I’ve heard that comment a million times... and also to answer your question, I think both sound good and I share your disgust about the quality of a “bad” piano. So many ppl tell me I sound amazing while I internally scream and cringe and rant about how horrible it is, and on a stage you can actually fake it until you make it big time. Anyway, I applaud you and all your ragtime arrangements and performances! From your California fan :)
OMG , i dont care what you do , you are adorable . xx
When in high school, I borrowed an electronic tuner from our band director and tuned our piano. It was not perfect but it was heck of a lot better.
I will FOR SURE buy your sheets when you release them 😊 I’ll post it, but it’ll never be as good as the original
I've been tuning mine for years with a quarter inch ratchet extension, vice grips, and slices of eraser. I just do it by ear until it's good enough for me. The piano is about one hundred years old.
Haha I have to chuckle. My aunt had 5 pianos in her house. One was a concert grand (Steinway) that took up the entire living room. She had an upright, console, baby grand anf a player piano. She could not read music, but yoy could hum a song, she could play it. She loved playing rag too. She had a piano tuner come in once every 3 mo to tune all of her pianos. It got very expensive so my uncle learned how to tune then himself. It was funny watching him tune them as my aunt had perfect pitch and Would yell at him "no! That's wrong!" One of the most important parts of a piano is the pin block that holds the pegs. If your piano goes out of tune often, the pin block may have to be replaced. And get a quality pin block too.
Question: what temperament does your piano tuner use? Does he do ET or something else?
I love old pianos
tuning a piano is a job, be patient , and protect your hears
the man who was tuning my mom's piano (an erhard if i'm not wrong) had 2 tools, his keys and hears, i spent hours watching him, learning, and for sure listening!!
But i'm sure you can do it!!
Oh yeah, thats why out there are piano-tuner :-) My brother and I have bought an old piano a couple of years ago, the previous owner had spend much money into it but now it is tuned a half note down because there is the fear, that the body can't hold the pressure of a 440hz tuning. And even if the tunerman was there, it wont hold long until the middle octaves are out-of-tune again. I have tried to fix that once, but no chance. Maybe I am no good player, but I can here it, if it sounds tuned. - But I love the look of that old thing with candle-holders.
I tried to tune my piano...and like you I bought a kit and set to. I got it in tune with itself in Bb - which actually wasn't too much of an issue as I play clarinet. the problem came when I snapped two strings. I desperately want to know how to replace them or get them replaced. I'd really like to work as a piano tuner...but I'm not great at playing.
Tuning a piano is no easy task but I really enjoy your music!
"I just don't think I'm cut out for this tuning S h i t" 😂😂 love it
I pretty much knew how this was going to turn out before watching (sorry) 😂. Don't be too hard on yourself. It's 92 years old and sounds like it would need a complete overhaul. The wooden board the pegs are on probably needs completely replacing and so that's why the notes were slipping from one day to the next. No way to tune a piano like that unless it's fixed first which can end up being seriously expensive. On a sidenote I remember being at school (too many years ago now to mention) and we had a piano tuner come in to tune the grand piano there and he was both blind and deaf! To say I was completely gobsmacked is putting it lightly. I've never heard a piano tuned so well before or after that tuner. Also to tune a piano I was told by a tuner years ago that using software Apps is not always great (depends on the App) as the bottom C (for instance) on a piano will (and should) actually be out of tune slightly with the top C and so on and so forth or you get an awful sound. It's definitely an art form which only certain people can do so don't be hard on yourself. Your playing is excellent and beautiful so you stick to that as that is a gift.
Hey kiddo, you crack me up. Be well, good to hear from you again.
Awesome work Kristen, keep it up. Lve ur vids
I remember as a kid in the early 1950's we had a blind man come and tune the pianos yes had two pianos and two organs back then.
How much was the tuning kit? I’m moving and thinking about finding a free piano and learning to tune it!
Lol I found this so funny, it took me 2 years to learn tuning at The City Of Leeds Collage Of Music( CLCM) I actually learnt tuning on a Kemble as one of the many pianos. All by ear as well no gadgets involved 😉
So brave tuning the piano, but will be great when you crack it! 👏
Had a similar expereince a month ago. Was using a random website and my laptops mic it took me a few days to get thru and i realized i had the wrong tuning wrench i called a tuner and he didnt think i fucked anything up but its so much harder than it seems ive been playing about 14 years too
Please play one full rag /stride song on it just to see how much character it has...Keep it!
you make even crappy pianos sound amazing. So awesome.
Heeeyyy i had the same tuning kit in New Zealand lol its a good learning experience i did it on my own piano but what i did on mine I tuned it in 5ths i found it easier dunno how lol
Considering the piano was close to 100 years old and likely not one of Kimball's top of the line models to begin with, and that you had no experience or guidance in piano tuning, I think you did an excellent job. Bravo for stepping so far out of your comfort zone. Certainly ended better than my first attempt at woodworking.
You can’t use a standard chromatic tuner to tune a piano... Try Entropy or TuneLab. If you use very fine movements and tune it multiple times, eventually the tuning should hold.
I'm no pianist by any means, but I think you did a fine job with the old piano. It doesn't sound teeth-grinding horrid, at least to me.
Love your renditions of all the piano classics that you play. well done!
Love the "Play Me" in the dust!🤣🤣🤣
But seriously, nice try on the job. You'd probably got farther than I would've.
Love your music, makes me wonder what I'd sound like if I kept up with piano lessons.
It’s never too late to return to a piano...
That’s awesome you play Pokémon go, and the piano !
you are too much of a perfectionist the old piano sounds MUCH better than when you start good job for a first time
I was only planning on watching a minute of this, but then I couldn't look away. From what little I've read on the subject, most unmaintained pianos that old are pretty much lost causes, so from the beginning it was like watching a train wreck. But nobody was going to get hurt. Good for you for giving it a try, I hope it was a bit of a learning experience anyway!
I heard that Baldwin's are good pianos!😊🎼
Hi Kristen, I listen to your ragtime piano o playing, I also play along with you on my 26 string rag time harp, very interesting
You are really good, keep it up.
how old is your personal piano? also i know you could probably say i'm not the best at telling if a piano is out of tune but personally i thought the older piano didn't sound to bad lol. anyway have a good day everyone!
Very cool video. Do you give piano lessons for beginners?
What kind of tuner do you have on your tablet ??
Does anybody know what the arrangement in 2:25 is called? I'm wondering what the name is.
Hold on and I will try to find it...
Swipsey Cake Walk, by Scott Joplin. See the video where Kristen plays it at Disneyland ...
Marcus, did you come back and get the answer yet???
Richard Snyder Hey, thank you for your help. I got the answer.
You've got some fancy gadgets for piano tuning. You should take your time and be patient with your mom's piano. Learn how to tune it up and get an understanding of the mechanics of the instrument, how it works, what does what and how. All you can do is grow from the experience.Good luck, I love hearing you play, you have a gift
That was different ... and cool!
I tried tuning a few pianos in the past because I had one lady who wanted to give her kids piano lessons but was too cheap to pay a professional tuner. Nightmare! She had two pianos. First was a very awful player piano. Second was a baby grand. Neither had been tuned for at least 30 years. She said, "It sounds good to me" BEFORE I tuned either one of them. I got the pianos to be in tune with themselves so that if you played them, you would actually recognize the song. That's about as far as my by-ear-with-a-single-A-440-tuning-fork-skill was going to bring either one of those pieces of junk. I told her, please get a pro in here. She never did. Most I'll do now is fix notes that drift on my 1935 Chickering Baby Grand. But yeah, when it's time for a real tuning, I hire a real tuner! Tuning is hard!!!!
haha your nephew is super cute! Future ragtime virtuoso!! :P
Wow! Never heard This is me in Ragtime. Very Nice!
What app are you using on that iPad? What are the axes on the graph?
I'm sorry, but i just love the saloon sound of the second one more than the sound of the first one. So good job on you :)
1928....you should tell people that George Gershwin once played on that piano 😁
What song was that at the end?? I liked it.
This is Me from the Greatest Showman. She said it's an arrangement she's working on currently. Was driving me crazy, really liked it.
This is me is the song. I just got to that part of the video. Wow! Never heard it in Ragtime Jonny May would be proud lol.
Hi, nice vidieo. I never thought there was so much to tuning a piano and at the same time I wasn't aware that they could "wear out". Curious if new strings would help or just what the issue is. I too like the older "saloon sound". Gotta give it to your mom, the price was right!!
Pianos are made to last. All instruments are made to last. Can you imagine the tens of thousands of dollars musicians would have to spend if they had to replace anything in their instrument! A piano that’s under 100 years old will still sound good IF it is properly maintained and tuned annually. If a piano is NOT played on a regular basis, it will need to be tuned at least every 6 months.
Thank you
Hilarious and candid, nice vlog!
I tune my own piano as well. It is an old Everett spinet from the early 1960s and requires more attention as the strings age. As strings age, they stretch and require more attention. Also, as strings age, they are more likely to break while tuning. I've replaced a few of those as well. The brass bridges shouldn't change, but pianos with wooden bridges suffer from expansion and contraction from humidity and temperature changes. Old pianos (especially uprights and spinets) often have wooden bridges in them, which makes tuning them impossible.
I understand the sympathies of those who don't like digital pianos, but I play mine in church and on the mission field. It is always in tune and I laugh as my guitar buddies are stopping to retune every hour or so. No, it doesn't have the bright sound of the "real thing," but it is portable and always ready to go.
What was the song you played at the end of the video? Regardless of the piano, you made it sound great!
2 notes from one key has got to be a known problem, and probably simple to fix once you have figured out how to remove (and replace) a complete key mechanism.
I really and enjoyed and bought your Friend Like Me arraganment. I'd definietly buy a Be Prepared one!
The best race car drivers are not necessarily the best mechanics (especially without training). My tuner had a one year apprenticeship. Hotdogs didn't tune his pianos. Nice effort but I wouldn't give up on the old piano as long as sound board is whole, and harp isn't cracked - the rest can be fixed
That's Horowitz.