•Recent items on tuning prompted me to find an old article I wrote on tuning which may be helpful. My own Wilhelm Bruder Soehne organ restoration is progressing well. It's a Model 79, 48 keyless, made in 1926. All the pipes have tuning slides! It should be easier tuning than so called 'fixed' tuning...

•Hi All, This posting is primarily directed to the piano tuners in the group but if anybody has an answer to my question, I'm all ears. One of my customers, who has a new Story & Clark player piano, is not pleased with the tuning of the piano. Why? It's in tune! He wants the piano to have "that Honk...

•John, Set one string in a unison 'flat ' and the one in the next unison 'sharp'. By alternating this up the scale the overall tension will not change causing further distortion of the plate and board. Make it dissonant to the degree that the customer wants to hear. In the future, the answer is to s...

•This is a new one for me! I suggest that you loan a tuning wrench to the customer and let them try tuning their own piano! (Just joking... they might do damage to the piano) Probably the best way to get the horrible honkey-tonk sound would be to lower each unison a third of a tone. That would do it...

•John, Tell him to wait for 6 months, it'll have that sound as settles into it's new home.... (Of course I'm being facetious). Actually, all you have to do is de-tune (by about 5-7 cents) all the intervals and it'll sound just like a barroom piano. The customer's always right..... Dan Armstrong Arms...

•Howdy. Leaving the piano on the front porch through an Illinois winter is fairly effective. Donovan

•John Tuttle asked about tuning a piano for a honky-tonk sound. Way back when, when I tuned pianos regularly, I had someone give me the same request as John received. I tuned the piano as I normally would, then I detuned most of the piano flat, one string per note, just enough so that it was a bit "...

•Hi All, First, a big thank you to all of the people who responded to my posting. It's an extreme pleasure to be a part of this group of kind-hearted and giving people who stop what they're doing to share their knowledge and opinions with others. There is unanimous agreement about one thing. There i...

•I'm thrilled to be far along with the Reproduco rebuild to be asking any tuning secrets for wooden pipes with sardine can type rolled metal tuning strips. They sound very uneven: some loud, some soft, some blow an octave higher, etc. Hopefully the year-long project will be done soon. Thanks, John M...

•Hi, In answer to John McClure's question about tuning pipes ["Tuning Reproduco Wooden Pipes With Metal Tops", 010428 MMD]: Before you can attempt any kind of a good tuning on the pipes, the pipes themselves have to be in good condition and the pressure should be known. The chest should be hooked up...

•Pitch of 150-year-old piano; the square grand saga continues... First, let me say thank you to all who commented on the possible value of my recently acquired square grand piano. I am especially grateful to D.L. Bullock for his encouraging comments on the restoration of the square grand. Based on h...

•Jim Hendershot could try tuning his 150-year-old square grand piano to A=415 Hz which is one semitone below modern concert pitch. Harpsichords are tuned to this pitch, as it was common prior to the nineteenth century, although in the early days there was no such thing as a standardised pitch, each ...

•Jim Hendershot is probably right when he says he will get as many numbers as there are answers! Things were not standardised even in Europe at that time, never mind in America. In Britain from 1846 to 1854 the Philharmonic Society pitch of A=452.5 Hz was quite often used, except by the famous Briti...

•Hi all, Kim Bunker here from Orange Coast Piano. I was reading this morning in this news letter about (A) tuning square grands and also (B) replacing the tracker bar in the Aeolian Orchestrelle. (A) The square grand originated in efforts of German builders (notably Johannes Socher in 1742) to adapt...

•Asking all MMD for help with information for a music box restoration. The problem is a Komet disc playing music box, single comb, 61 notes, that uses a 13 inch (approx. 33 cm) disc. The leads are totally fused together and must be replaced. There is _no_ tuner's mark or any information to be found ...

•In the event a more direct response isn't forthcoming, here's a possibility: If I could see some discs (either actual or very good scans, preferably of well-known tunes) I could probably deduce the correct relative scale. If you knew the pitch any one tine, then you'd have the complete tuning scale...

•There must be at least two 13-inch Komet disc formats. You mentioned that yours was a single comb (61 teeth). I have one that plays 13-inch discs and has two combs with a total of 84 teeth. The combs are arranged similar to a Regina double comb but each of the separate comb teeth is plucked by its ...

•I've recently become involved in the restringing of a Seeburg L. This is the truncated compass small nickelodeon with only piano and mandolin rail. There are eleven wrapped (bass) strings, and the rest are plain wire. Shortly the actual stringing will be complete and it will be time to chip it up t...

•[ Dean Randall asked, "Can any of the nickelodeon experts on [ this list tell me what note the first _plain wire_ string is?" I am no expert but "Treasures of Mechanical Music", by Arthur Reblitz and Q. David Bowers, says: "The Seeburg Style L cabinet piano has only 54 playing notes for the 58 note...

•[ Dean Randall asked, "Can any of the nickelodeon experts on [ this list tell me what note the first _plain wire_ string is?" In the Seeburg Lilliputian L version, there is only 54 playing notes, whereas in most A-roll pianos, you have 58 playing notes. The lowest note is a B, not an A#, and there ...