My Training and Experience
Who is qualified to service your piano?
There is no licensing of piano technicians, or any requirement for proof of competency. It is up to you to inquire about the background of anyone you consider paying to work on your piano. Your piano is both a musical instrument and a machine. You should only entrust it to a qualified technician. A technician can service your instrument, not just tune it.
Important questions and why to ask them:
How were you trained and by whom?
It is highly unlikely that anyone can learn to tune pianos well without training and a lot of feedback from a highly experienced piano technician. Excellent piano tuning is not something that can be self-taught, even if someone has a "good ear" and/or is a musician. Doing the same thing wrong over and over is not "experience" ... or not the kind of experience you want your technician to have.
Were you trained only in tuning, or in repair and regulation too?
A well trained piano technician should be able to properly repair parts on any standard piano, and be able to correctly regulate it for optimum performance. If the person you hire is "self-taught", the equivalent of a backyard auto mechanic, that person is just as likely to break your piano as fix it!
How much experience have you had (not in years, but pianos)?
Learning requires training, seeking out information from more experienced technicians, and a lot of practice! I tell people it takes as much time and energy to learn to tune well as it does to learn to play an instrument well. The equivalent of "doing your scales and etudes" is to tune and repair hundreds of pianos of all types.
Have you subjected your work to the scrutiny of more experienced technicians?
The Piano Technicians Guild offers the only standardized testing for piano technicians. This testing is completely voluntary. A technician can be competent at tuning and repair without taking these tests, but taking the test is the only guarantee of a minimum level of competency.
My Training
I was trained at the Fred Tremper School of Piano Technology in Maywood, IL, in 1982. My teachers and mentors were Fred Tremper and Alan Day, both of whom are RPTs and long time members of the Piano Technicians Guild (PTG). The course consisted of 10 hours training a week for 4½ months. Half of this time was devoted to tuning theory and practice, and half to repairs and regulation. After completing the class myself I assisted my mentors in teaching it for a year.
After tuning several hundred pianos, I took the Piano Technicians Guild tuning exam and passed it at the highest level possible. This tuning exam is very rigorous, and is the only standardized test to evaluate the skill of a piano tuner. Most people who advertise themselves as piano tuners have never even taken this test because they are too intimidated.
In 2006 I took and passed the rigorous PTG technical exam. Passing these tests earned me the designation of Registered Piano Technician (RPT).
I performed warranty work for Baldwin Pianos for several years in the Chicago area. In addition to tuning hundreds of pianos in customers' homes, churches and schools, I have also tuned for performances by Dave Brubeck, B. B. King, Lionel Hampton, Mandy Patinkin, The Chieftans, Roy Clark, Louise Mandrell, Steve Allen, and Mel Tormé, as well a dozens of other professional musicians while I lived in the Chicago area. I was also the tuner/tech for the music school at Joliet Junior College (IL) for three years. In the Rogue Valley, I am currently the piano tuner for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, and I have tuned for Pink Martinin and David Bromberg at Britt, as well as tuning at Oregon Cabaret Theater and for many local professional musicians.
"By Ear" or With Machine?
I was trained to tune "aurally," which means using a tuning fork to get the pitch of one note and then tuning all the other notes in relative relationship to that note. (See my pages on "Tuning") At the time I was trained, there were no electronic devices that could provide a tuning as good as my aural tunings. I tuned only aurally for about 20 years. In 2002, a piano technician and electronics expert designed a new software (Verituner™) which can "listen to" all the harmonics of a specific piano and then provide the best tuning for that piano. I now use this device, especially when a piano is considerably flat or sharp, since the machine can also compensate for this, often without my doing a separate "pitch raise". It is also especially helpful when there is background noise.
If a piano tuner is using an inexpensive, older device, that machine cannot provide an excellent tuning. I still believe that if a tuner cannot tune at all by ear it is an indication that s/he has not been willing to invest the time and energy into learning this skill and that the tuner cannot tell the difference between a bad tuning, a good tuning, and an excellent tuning. Using a good electronic aid can help create a good tuning only if the technician has learned good tuning technique, and only if the technician can do aural checks. In addition, whether tuning with or without any electronic aid, if a tuner has not been taught other important aspects of tuning, s/he will not be able to provide an excellent and stable tuning. In other words, if you bought a Verituner, you still would not be able to tune your piano correctly, or have it stay in tune after you were through. (If you would like to spend $1500 and try, here is the Verituner web site!)
Piano Technicians Guild
If you inquire about the background of a piano technician, you should be aware of the following distinctions regarding membership in the Piano Technicians Guild (PTG).
PTG Member - Anyone who has paid dues to the organization, whether a tuner or not.
RPT (Registered Piano Technician) - a member who has also taken and passed three exams: a written exam, an exam to demonstrate proficiency in tuning, and one to demonstrate skills in repair and regulation of the mechanical parts of the piano. If the technician uses an electronic device as an aid in tuning, s/he must demonstrate a basic skill level in tuning aurally as well.
I have passed the written, tuning and technical exams and have received the Registered Piano Technician designation.
There are many excellent piano technicians who have not taken these tests. Taking the tests demonstrates a standardized level of proficiency.
More information about the PTG is at their website, www.ptg.org
My non-piano tech background
I moved to the Rogue Valley in 1996 after living my whole life (until then) in the Chicago area. I played violin and viola in the Rogue Valley Symphony for 7 years and still play in other musical groups including the Cascade Strings trio, which performs for weddings and parties, and the North State Symphony (California). I sang in the Jefferson State Choral Coalition, and I offer web development and consulting through my business, Web Sitings. I have played the piano since I was 8 years old, although I rarely have time to play now. I have a BA in business administration and have taken graduate classes in computer information systems at Southern Oregon University.