REGULATION and VOICING

Regulation

This service involves maintaining the insides of a piano to ensure all the parts are working correctly. As one of the most complicated instruments invented, a piano has thousands of moving parts that make the instrument work. In a single key, there are over 25 parts that require adjustment to keep the instrument working correctly. Multiply this by 88 keys, and you have over several thousand parts. Over time, constant playing, changes in the weather, and deteriorating felts will send these parts out of alignment, gradually making the piano more difficult to play. If your piano is producing an uneven touch, sticky keys, and/or things are just not working properly, then it is probably in need for regulating. Small regulation procedures can be included as part of the tuning. A full regulation takes many hours to complete and is charged by the day. How long this takes, depends on the condition of the instrument and how much work needs to be done. A full piano regulation is recommended every 5 years. If you find that you are having any of these problems, please contact Charles before problem gets more irritating!

Voicing

The overall tone of a piano is produced by the hammer felts. If the hammer felts are too hard, the instrument will produce a bright, metallic tone. Voicing is the process of removing this sound to bring back the mellow musical sound the piano was designed for. This process can only be done if the piano has been tuned and regulated correctly and can be included as part of the tuning. Please contact Charles for more information.