How often should my piano be tuned?
You can have it tuned as often or as little as you want, but a good guideline would be twice a year. The best value would be in the fall after your furnace has been on for a bit, and again in the spring after the rain has begun.

Why does a piano go out of tune?
A piano goes out of tune because of the changes in humidity, changes in temperature, slipping tuning pins, stretching strings and hard playing, but the biggest changes occur because of changing humidity.

Why is humidity important?
The more constant the humidity is, the more stable the tuning will be. In Calgary, our winters are very dry, and this can be very hard on a piano.  The sound board has a ‘crown’ to it, a curve, like the top of a guitar. The strings put downward pressure on this, and that’s where the resonance of a piano is produced. The  crown of this soundboard is susceptible to changes in humidity, and will rise and fall with the seasons. In the winter, when the wood dries out, your piano will go flat, and in the spring when the humidity rises, the piano will go sharp.  Unfortunately these changes are not uniform across the keyboard, so it ends up sounding undesirable.

What’s the best way to humidify a piano?
The optimum  environment for a piano is 42% humidity. This is hard to achieve in Calgary. You would have to run your furnace humidifier all the time in the winter to get close to 42%, which would cause your windows to fog and ice up on cold days. If you open the doors during a Chinook, the humidity would disappear. A better way to humidify a piano is to use a built in humidifier like the Dampp Chaser Piano Life Saver.  It keeps the internal environment of the piano constant, and makes a great improvement to the tuning stability.  Jerry can install one for you. It’s a great investment for your piano.  

How long will a piano tuning take?
A piano tuning needs 75 minutes to 2 hours to accomplish the job effectively. This also depends upon whether a pitch raise is required or not.

What’s a pitch raise?
A pitch raise is a quick rough tuning, to get the piano ‘in the ball park’ before attempting the final fine tuning. Iif you try to bring a very flat piano to pitch, by the time you are finished, the notes you started with will be slightly flat again, because of all the added tension on the sound board.  (and vice versa for a sharp piano)

How long will a tuning last?
For a concert , or recording purposes, a piano tuner would service the piano for each session. For the average pianist however, the tuning should last for several months, depending on humidity, temperature change,  playing style, and the health of the piano.

Will it hurt the piano not to tune it?
Your your piano will not be damaged if you choose not to tune it, it just won’t be the best experience possible for the player. Also it will makes subsequent tunings a bit more laborious for the piano tuner, and a pitch raise may be required.

If you can't find your question answered here, please call Jerry at 403-803-9306