Most manufacturers recommend that you tune your piano once every six months for the best sound. If you are playing your instrument regularly this is sound advice. Even if your piano is seeing minimal use, I recommend tuning at least once a year. Concert venues, teachers, professionals, and others who are serious about the quality of sound from their piano may require several tunings in a year.
When servicing your piano, I will always give it a thorough inspection. Minor adjustments and/ or repairs are included in the cost of a tuning. If you're interested in its history, its parts, or its working condition, just ask. When additional or more intensive maintenance is required, I'll give you a personalized recommendation about how to proceed.
If it has been several years since your piano was last tuned it may require a pitch raise. In general, the more the strings of a piano are adjusted, the more they will resist a tuning.
Due to substantial and drastic changes in string tension during a pitch raise, a follow up fine tuning is necessary for accuracy and stability. This fine tuning should be scheduled three to four weeks after the first visit to allow the strings to fully settle.
I recommend setting up tunings at regular intervals. If your next appointment is scheduled during each visit you will receive $30 off your next service. This discount will apply even if you end up needing to change the appointment.
Pianos are targets for a lot of dust and greasy buildup. Buildup under the keys, on the pins that they ride upon, and in the inner playing mechanism will cause sluggishness or sticking in response to the player and may lead to damage to fine parts. What I will do, is remove the action and the keybed and clean out debris using compressed air, vacuum and small brushes. Before replacing the action, I tighten all screws, polish the metal friction points, and lubricate the moving parts.
The inner playing mechanism of your piano is called the action. The action is an amazingly complex and sensitive machine and needs to be kept in adjustment so that it works and feels the way it is supposed to. Every key on your piano has over 25 points of adjustment which all work together to produce the sound you hear when a single note is played. To compensate for wear, compacting of cloth and felt, and changes in wooden parts due to humidity, periodic adjustments must be made.
Every piano has its own unique sound or voice- but, over time, hammer felt wears down, compacts, and becomes misshapen. These changes can cause the tone to become too harsh or bright making it difficult to produce a wide or even range of expression. In other situations, the piano may sound dull or lifeless. By treating the hammers in various ways such as aligning, shaping, careful needling, or hardening them, it is possible to reestablish a more pleasant-sounding tone to your piano.
Pianos should be kept in an environment that has a humidity level around 42%. The Piano Life Saver System by Dampp-Chaser helps keep the humidity comfortably ideal. As a result, the thousands of wood and felt parts of your piano remain significantly more stable, leaving tunings and regulation much more stable as well. Proper humidity control also helps prevent or eliminate numerous other problems. Installing humidity control in your piano may be the most important investment for your piano.