"P"otD

Notes from the Berkshires, Day 62

Bernstein Pavillion, 10.00 a.m.

Yesterday turned into a ridiculously rainy day; flash flood warnings and all. I was quite busy in spite of that, until early/mid afternoon, when I ran out of schedule space. Managed good work in the Chamber Music hall, Manor House, and on the harpsichord in Birch before calling it an afternoon and heading home for a late lunch and some reading. Returned for an artist’s piano selection only to find that he was delayed by the weather, and might not arrive until much later. Steve, Emily and I repaired to Chez Carver for a light dinner, good Belgian beer and conversation until around 8.00.

This morning the sun is shining, and the sky is blue – we’ve gone from one extreme to the other yet again. No complaints here. I spent 2+ hours in Maple, tuning the B that appears to be the one in use now; surprisingly, even with all the rain and humidity, the pitch had sagged to a shade under 440, so I raised it and tuned it, and checked out all the functions. By the time I finished tuning there were fellows arriving for a rehearsal, so no further work was possible at that point. Back to the courtyard to wait for a team meeting and then over to Birch to tune the harpsichord again for the afternoon’s rehearsal before leaving the grounds for the day. Another perfect afternoon for a long run, and I’m going to take full advantage; it won’t be long before I’ll be back to running on flat roads exclusively, so I’ll enjoy the hills while I can.

If all goes well, and I can keep my pianos in good shape, Steve says I should be able to take off for home two weeks from today. The next two weeks will be full of work, and will go very quickly, and that’s good – this Fellow is ready to be home again.

“Piano” of the Day I:



II:



III:



The harpsichord, in the piano room in Ozawa, after my first attempts at tuning it. Two manuals, able to be coupled to play unisons on two sets of strings, plus a 4’ set of strings wwhich can be engaged and coupled to the upper manual. Tuning is actually a breeze; after tuning a temperament (using primarily 4ths and 5ths), one simply tunes pure octaves out in both directions from the middle on the lower manual, then couples the upper manual and tunes the unisons created by the coupling. Tuning the 4’ (which I haven’t done yet, as the shift rail is frozen by humidity and unusable) involves tuning more pure octaves from the top (uncoupled) manual, which plucks both strings. It’s a nice change from piano tuning, and something I wouldn’t mind doing more of down the road.