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bass string damage (finger strumming)

  • 1.  bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-29-2014 14:53
      |   view attached
    I have attached a photo of my current project piano here at Sac State. I finished stringing it just before going off to vacation in the second week of July. I had to roll it out of my office so they could refinish the floor so I put it backstage in the cage. Apparently someone reached in through the cage to experience the thrill of strumming a piano. Since these are brand new bass strings you can clearly see every place they touched the strings.

    I am sharing this photo because I have had many discussions with "artists" who wanted to do various things inside a piano. In every case they loudly proclaim that it won't injure the piano. It is rare to have such clear evidence of what happens when oily fingers meet copper strings. Feel free to use this photo as ammo in case you are ever in a similar situation.

    By the way, I can see the finger marks on the plain wires too.

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    Ted Kidwell, RPT
    California State University, Sacramento
    Capistrano Hall, rm. 153
    6000 J Street
    Sacramento, CA 95819-6015
    916.278.6737

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  • 2.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-29-2014 15:47
    I recently had a situation in which some bass strings were damaged to the point of having to be replaced from some kind of strumming (I presume, not really sure what they did exactly).  This was a relatively new set of bass strings (less than a year) and after this particular concert several of them were both dead and rattling. 

    They were billed for the replacements, FWIW.

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    David Love RPT
    www.davidlovepianos.com
    davidlovepianos@comcast.net
    415 407 8320
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  • 3.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Posted 07-29-2014 18:04
    David L,

    It would be a nice to know what actually happened to ruin a "less than a year old" set of bass strings.

    Hope it comes to surface somewhere down the road for you to share with this thread.

    Let's face it, none of us knows what happens while tending to other things.

    Keith McGavern, RPT
    Shawnee, Oklahoma, USA
    kam544@allegiance.tv
    [Visual Tuning Platform User]
    [iRCT & OnlyPure ]



  • 4.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-29-2014 18:36
    My understanding was that the strings were "played" using some kind of object, piece of metal, I don't know.  You could see that the copper wraps were marred.  What they used I never found out.  Fortunately it was only four or six strings (don't recall now) that had to be replaced. 

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    David Love RPT
    www.davidlovepianos.com
    davidlovepianos@comcast.net
    415 407 8320
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  • 5.  RE:bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-30-2014 07:22
    Was there any damper felt damage?

    --Cy--

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    Cy Shuster, RPT
    Albuquerque, NM
    http://www.shusterpiano.com
    http://www.facebook.com/shusterpiano
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  • 6.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-30-2014 09:36
    Not in this case. ------------------------------------------- David Love RPT www.davidlovepianos.com davidlovepianos@comcast.net 415 407 8320 -------------------------------------------


  • 7.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Posted 07-31-2014 06:47
    From the photo it would appear there were no dampers installed when you put it in the cage. This means, of course, that it would resonate to any sympathetic vibrations around and would attract attention to any of a curious disposition. Hence the damage. Am I right in this assumption? If so it seems a pity that a blanket wasn't laid on those strings to 'dampen' them whilst stored in this state of 'undress'.  Michael (UK)

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    Michael Gamble
    semi retired
    Brighton
    01273813612
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  • 8.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-30-2014 09:31
      |   view attached
    Attached is a picture of strings that were installed last month! The student that did it didn't wear gloves (we usually do) and had very acidic skin. Since it is a practice room piano I'm going to let it go and see what happens. My experience is that they go dead in a short time. Why is that? No dirt, really. Only discoloration. Any thoughts?

    Jim

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    James Busby
    Mt Pleasant UT
    801-422-3400



  • 9.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Posted 07-31-2014 06:52

    I didn't see the whole photograph when making my comment about blanket damping. Sorry! (but such a blanket would have caused a less attractive proposition to those 'finger-pickers'!   Michel (UK)
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    Michael Gamble
    semi retired
    Brighton
    01273813612
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  • 10.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-30-2014 10:30
    The problem is that to non-technicians the "damage" looks like a minor cosmetic blemish, certainly worth the artistic benefits of strumming or blocking the aliquots of bass strings. The tension between the technician and musician will exist as long as the musician perceives prepared piano techniques as a legitimate way of expanding the instrument's expressivity, and I don't see that going away anytime soon. 

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    Mario Igrec
    http://www.pianosinsideout.com
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  • 11.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-30-2014 23:24
    The faculty member here who does the most inside the piano playing always uses thin white cotton gloves when touching strings. That is a nice model for our students.

    To be fair, it depends a lot on the individual pianist and how active the hand sweat glands are. Mine, for instance, put out next to nothing in my climate (at the moment we are in our high humidity period of 50 - 60% RH, and my hands are still very dry - though when I am in 80% conditions they begin to sweat somewhat). So I can touch strings a lot without really worrying about it, which makes stringing a lot easier - and the strings are just as shiny when I am done and months later, so I know there is no delayed reaction. My son, on the other hand, has perpetually wet palms, and goes through guitar strings in no time. If he strummed a set of bass strings, I'd expect them to look like the photos that have been posted.

    I'll put in a plug for the Protocol for Extended Techniques in Piano Performance the CAUT Committee recently produced. You can find it on the CAUT page, as text, and also as a Word Document file in the CAUT Public Library. It is probably about time we did some layout and produced it as a pamphlet. Any comments on the text would be most welcome.

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    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
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  • 12.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-31-2014 09:31
    And it's not only how much one perspires but how acidic one's perspiration is. I started using jeweler's cotton gloves when I realized that after a while I can see where I touched a piano string.

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    Mario Igrec
    http://www.pianosinsideout.com
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  • 13.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-31-2014 10:04
    The question still remains; why does this superficial tarnishing seem to make strings go dead? It isn't enough oil to get between the windings and collect gunk. In my experience they go dead within a year or two.

    Jim

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    James Busby
    Mt Pleasant UT
    801-422-3400
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  • 14.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 07-31-2014 10:30
    I've had several pianos where there was discoloration from, apparently, finger contact but I haven't found that the strings necessarily went dead after a time.  How you found this to be consistently true (that they go dead)?

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    David Love RPT
    www.davidlovepianos.com
    davidlovepianos@comcast.net
    415 407 8320
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  • 15.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 08-02-2014 09:16
    Yes, if every time students put their hands on the strings and discolored them then they went dead, we would be in a fix. But in the last 2 years I've had 3 sets of brand new strings discolored by students in a composition class. Their teacher was adamant that they had washed their hands first, but the strings were first discolored, then dead. One was like the one I pictured where a student who strung it had acidic hands and in about a year the strings were dead.

    Maybe it was coincidence. From what you fellows wrote I think it could be. Or, maybe I was just so mad about it that I imagined they were more dead than they really were! Discoloration could be nothing but a visual thing.

    Jim

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    James Busby
    Mt Pleasant UT
    801-422-3400
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  • 16.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 08-01-2014 11:46
    They don't necessarily go dead in my experience.

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    Mario Igrec
    http://www.pianosinsideout.com
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  • 17.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 08-01-2014 12:26
    My experience is the same as Mario's and David's - I have never had bass strings go dead from finger contamination issues. OTOH, a tiny drop of soda can do that. As can a tiny drop of soda at the agraffe. I would guess that sweaty enough hands could contaminate enough to make strings go dead, but it hasn't happened to me.

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    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
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  • 18.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 08-01-2014 23:10


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    James Geiger
    Waco TX
    254-756-2976
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    It is not how much oil.  It is oil.  Oil kills bass strings.  Even the spray can of furniture polish used be the housekeeper can kill (permanently) bass strings.



  • 19.  RE: bass string damage (finger strumming)

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 08-01-2014 10:46
    Thin, white cotton gloves are cheap. http://www.premiumuniformal.com/ug01.html has them at 50¢ a pair by the dozen pairs. I think I'll buy a dozen or two, to have on hand to give to pianists.

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    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
    -------------------------------------------