I provide piano services throughout the greater Traverse City (MI) area, including schools, churches, concert venues, community centres, and homes. Whether it’s an upright, spinet, or grand piano, each instrument receives the same level of meticulous care. Contact me today; I’m here to answer your questions and schedule a visit!
If your piano is used for professional performance, it should be tuned before each concert. For schools and churches, twice annually is often enough unless the facility is large and heating/cooling isn’t continually kept at comfortable levels. In the home, most pianos hold a tune fairly well for at least a year or two.
Just as with an automobile tune-up, the piano tuning process can catch potential structural or mechanical issues before they become worse. I strongly recommend not allowing more than two years between tuning for casual piano owners.
Tricky question. If you have some ear for music, you may be able tell when chords or individual notes sound “off” or produce a vibration you can feel in your ears. Sometimes the out-of-tune piano sounds “tinny,” like an instrument in an old west saloon (trivia: studios will de-tune a piano to achieve this effect for films!). If your piano is used by a student, ask the teacher if it sounds “right” to them. Otherwise, I’m happy to come to your location and inspect the instrument.
The #1 simple answer? Time. With more than 230 strings in the average piano, strings stretch a little over time, lowering the notes. Also, those strings exert hundreds of thousands of pounds of pressure on the pin-block and soundboard, which can wear down over the decades.
Temperature and humidity changes also affect a piano’s ability to hold tuning; the less controlled these changes are, the more often the instrument requires adjustment. And excess humidity can cause additional problems: corrosion of strings and other petal parts, and mildew on the many felted surfaces inside the piano. Those issues can greatly diminish the quality of the instrument’s sound.
Finally, the piano is sensitive to excessive movement. With many delicate and interacting parts on each of the 88 keys, movement can both affect the tuning AND cause parts to misaligned, making keys difficult or impossible to play. The further a piano is moved (across a room, around a building or across town), the more likely it is that it will require adjustment and/or tuning to play correctly.
That’s a sensitive issue, especially among piano technicians and tuners. As with doctors, piano technicians and tuners have different specialities, certifications and preferences for how their practice operates.
I prefer to just tune pianos. Yes, I will inspect your instrument for potential mechanical issues before I begin tuning; if I can rectify the issue simply, I’ll do so (after getting your permission). If regulation or repair is required, I will refer you to a local specialist – I’m a member of the Piano Technicians Guild, and will recommend a fully-certified associate for the work.
I charge by the half-hour. Some pianos require only a little adjustment to bring them back to where they should be (more likely if tuned regularly!), while others require much more time and effort to bring them “up to pitch.” Most of my tuning vary in cost between $125 and $175; on infrequent occasions, the cost is below or above this range.
My name is Sean, and I am a lifelong student of both the piano and organ. I’ve been playing pianos since I was young. Even though I chose to pursue other careers, I have continued to write, perform, and teach piano on the side.
A friend in the arts encouraged me to pursue training in piano service work a decade ago. Since 2018, I have tuned and serviced hundreds of pianos for clients in Michigan and Indiana.