MY KID PLAYS FOR THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

GRANDCHILDREN, MINE, are working on their future college placements.....by playing the piano! Surprised? Studies show that music students score higher on the SATs in both verbal and math skills than their non-musical peers. Music participants also receive more academic honors and awards, have higher grade point averages, and score higher on standardized tests. Musicians are also the largest single group admitted to medical schools. Doubt it? On your next office visit, ask your doctor what instrument he or she plays. Almost all physicians have musical backgrounds. This is why all four of my grandkids are involved in music. A recent ten year study of 25,000 students proved that musicians are better equipped to comprehend mathematical and scientific concepts, regardless of socioeconomic backgrounds. Even students who are underachievers, or, have behavioral problems, show improvement after embarking on music lessons. In study after study, scientists are finding correlations between music making and the deepest workings of the human brain. College age musicians prove to be emotionally healthier than their non-musician counterparts. In addition, many colleges give substantial scholarships to musicians, especially pianists. A student need not even be enrolled in the music program. An engineering major willing to play for the glee club, or chapel, can often earn a free ride. A parent can brag that "My kid plays for the University Of Pennsylvania." and the kid never touches a football. Next time a decision needs to be made between music, sports, or, some other activity, choose music. Preferably the piano.
NO TALENT IS NEEDED to play the piano. Agreed, it takes talent to become a great pianist, but, to play a piano reasonably well requires less comprehension and hand to eye coordination, than it takes to operate an automobile. Unlike other instruments that require a player to make, or form, the note tones, all one need to do on a piano is simply push down a key. Although a piano keyboard looks complicated, there are actually only a dozen keys to deal with. The same dozen keys repeat themselves at lower or higher pitch all up and down the keyboard. Picture an automobile with six steering wheels lined up across the dash board, and, any one you choose, will steer the car. An average adult, willing to devote twenty minutes a day, can learn to play most popular music, reasonably well, in about six months. Most children who practice ten minutes, twice a day, five days a week, can become proficient in both classical and popular music in five to seven years. Many parents whine that their kids "don't show any interest," or, "get bored easily." If reading or math were approached on that basis, then, kids would never learn those skills either. Music is an important part of every child's education. Do your job, parent!
HELP IS AVAILABLE. If you need a teacher, have a piano to be tuned or repaired, or, wish to rent or purchase a piano at reasonable cost, call me at 609-220-6589.

I CAME WITH THE PIANO

The two gentlemen pictured need no photo caption. That's how it is when your really famous. In my long carrier as a piano tuner/technician, I have had the privilege being of service to so many of the greats. People who became celebrities the old fashioned way, thru real talent and hard work. Not because of some publicity stunt they pulled that landed them on the Internet. Why do there performers choose me as their piano technician? To be truthful they usually just wind up with me by chance. I came along with the piano that was rented for the concert. I am one of the tuners who does work for the venue they appeared at. The concert promoter uses me when the need arises. Often I get to meet the artist. Sometimes I become their regular technician and even take care of their home piano. Sometimes we get to be friends. In a few rare cases, usually do to a common interest, we hang out together.

MY RULES CONCERNING CELEBRITIES: I treat them like regular people, which they appreciate. They grow weary of the fawning, fussing, groveling, and the yes yes yesing! I deal with them in a professional, but, friendly manner. I do not ask for photos, autographs, tickets, or, other favors. If something is offered I graciously accept. I am respectful of their talent, but, do not rave on. I do give what help I can offer. It can be as simple a thing as offering to bring back a cup of coffee when I go to get one for myself. The most important thing is I am always honest if my opinion is asked. Celebrities hate being lied to.

Those whom have played or performed with pianos I have tuned are in alphabetical order by last name: Jenna Angeloni, Burt Bacharach, Tony Bennett, Victor Borge, Ray Charles, Kristin Chenoweth, Janie Christina, Judy Collins, Ginger Coyle, Duke Ellington, Ferranti & Teicher, Melody Gardot, Billy Joel, Elton John, Lang Lang, Liberace, Al Martino, Taylor Mason, Liza Minnelli, Dudley Moore, Ricky Nelson, Willie Nelson, Peter Nero, Luciano Pavarotti, Frank Sinatra, Roger Williams, and many others. I'm sure I've forgotten someone. E-mail me if I did.

Of course I've also done work for hundreds of the rich and famous who are not musical performers such as actors, politicians, professional athletes, socialites, royalty, etc. And then there are the regular folks who are the bulk of any piano tuner's clients, but, many of which have interesting stories of their own. In this blog, I hope to write about them all. Incidently, I have also played piano as a studio session musician for many recording artists. If you would like to HEAR ME PLAY THE PIANO just Google Janie Christina. The pianist backing her up on any of her recordings is me, or, E-Mail rockpresspublishing@comcast.net and request free MP3 downloads.

CELL PHONE SURPRISE!

I GREW UP with telephones. When I was a youngster most people who lived in the city did not have home telephones. The several phone booths at the corner store served the neighborhood. Later, in my preteens, most families had two or four party lines. If things got dull you picked up the receiver, holding your hand over the mouthpiece, and listened in on the neighbors conversations. By the time I was in high school, private lines had finally arrived. All phones were rotary dial until the touch tone phone arrived when I was in my twenties. I had a small part in developing the touch tone system. See my blog THE 88 KEY ADDICTION.
AS A PIANO TECHNICIAN the telephone has always been a lifeline for my business. I always kept up with the latest technology. I was one of the first people in my area to have a mobile car phone, more than thirty years ago. The device took up more than half of the trunk of my full sized sedan. It required a huge antenna. It cost about $2500.00 to purchase (about $4,000.00 in today;s dollars) and $100.00 a month just to be connected, plus, $1.00 a minute to talk. The expense was justified because it freed my wife from having to stay in the office anytime I was on the road to field phone calls. Quite often I would arrive at a customer's home to tune a piano and they would inquire about the antenna. Of, course, they would stroll out to the car to look at the phone. I would tell them if they would cover the dollar a minute charge they could try it out. Usually some guy would call his brother and say, "Ron, you won't believe it, but, I'm talking to you from a car!"
EVENTUALLY I GRADUATED to a portable phone that was about the size of a small suitcase. I was able to carry it around with me and stay in touch. Once, when eating at a lunch counter, the device rang loudly and startled the gentleman seated on the stool beside me. Upon answering the call, I realized it was my wife. I handed the receiver to the still shaken fellow and calmly said, "it's for you."
IN MY LIFE, I've gone from no phone in the home to a cell phone I can hold in the palm of my hand and talk on inexpensively. Amazing!

MISTAKEN IDENTITY

Meet my cat Gaitway Jordan, rescued him from an animal shelter in 2000. He was found abandoned by a gate in a park so the shelter named him Gateway. I changed the spelling to Gaitway and added the Jordan. Almost always, when I am at the computer, he sits by my side. Just thought you might like to meet my "editor." Now, on with the story:

About forty years ago I was tuning a piano in the recreation center of a nursing home when a lady in a wheel chair rolled up and settled in to watch me work. As I plunked along note by note setting each string into proper tune, more and more people showed up to watch. Soon I had gathered quite an audience. I kept tuning, plunk, ping, ding, on and on for most of an hour. When I was finished, I packed up my tools and made my way thru the crowd towards the exit. A white haired woman in a wheel chair tugged at my sleeve and said, "We appreciate your effort in coming here young man, but, you're the worst piano player we've ever heard!" I went back to the piano and played a couple of tunes......just to redeem myself.

THE THANKSGIVING BABY MONITOR AFFAIR

VINTAGE FISHER PRICE BABY MONITOR

The average Piano Technician visits a clients home several times a year, often spending an hour or more working and chatting.  You get to know the family well. Watch the kids grow up. Witness their triumphs and tragedies. Attend some of the weddings and too many of the funerals. See a lot of marriages break up. Often a cheating spouse is found out by accident.  I had a businessman send Valentines Day flowers to both his mistress and his wife.  The florist mixed up the deliveries and the wife wound up with the flowers and card intended for the mistress.  Then there was the Doctor who, after telling his wife he could not afford a new car for her, bought one for his girlfriend.  Imagine the wife's surprise when she got a telephone message from the dealership saying it was time to bring in HER new car for its first service appointment.  I could write pages of  similar stupid mistakes that resulted in divorce, but, the most bazaar of all was the Thanksgiving baby monitor affair.

After the Lindbergh Baby was kidnapped from the family's nursery in 1932,  ZENITH went to work on developing a system to monitor a baby's room which it marketed in 1937 as the ZENITH RADIO NURSE. Not many were ever sold because the price of $20 was equivalent to over $300 in today's money.  In the early 1980s, building on the new wireless phone technology, FISHER PRICE picked up the ball and started marketing baby monitors at a more affordable price.  Still, not many were in use at that time, so, when visiting a nursery one would not assume a monitor was in use.

A family we will call XX had a daughter who was a freshman in collage and also, a late in life, newborn son.  Family XX was hosting Thanksgiving dinner for their next door neighbors, and long time friends, family ZZ. As dinner wound down XX's coed daughter excused herself saying she had plenty to eat and was going upstairs to check on her new baby brother.  A bit later the husband from family ZZ went off to use the bathroom.  He met up with the daughter in the nursery and they set about resuming an affair which had began when the girl was a high school junior. Neither mister ZZ, nor daughter XX, was aware that a baby monitor was broadcasting their goings on in the nursery directly to the dining room bellow!  A Thanksgiving dinner no one will ever forget.

MEET THE FAMILY

THERE IS NOTHING LIKE A BIRTHDAY PARTY TO BRING THE FAMILY TOGETHER. In this case it's 2003 and it's mine. The grand kids tried to put all the candles on the cake, but, they were overcome by the heat. The two photos with me and the cake are my kids and grand kids. The dog is Katie. The yellow cat is Simba. The gray and white cat is Gaitway Jordan.  The grand kids are all grown, the pets have all passed away, and I've enjoyed many great birthdays since.  We Welsh people believe that your family is your legacy. I'm a rich man.

"OUR CHRISTMAS MIRACLE"

                                           PAINTING OF MORRIS HUTCHINS RUGER
                                               by FRANCIS CALDWELL CIRCA 1936

For a number of years, I tuned the piano for Robert Morris Ruger of Haddon Heights, New Jersey.  Mr. Ruger was a true Renaissance man.  Besides being a gifted musician and popular piano teacher, Ruger was a noted mathematician who worked for Boeing on the Apollo project as well as a boxer and Boston Marathon runner. Near the piano hung a painting of his father, Morris Hutchins Ruger at his own piano smoking his trade mark pipe.  Morris Ruger, a Julliard graduate, was a renowned pianist, but, is most noted as a composer of orchestral works, string and woodwind ensembles, choral concerts and operas.  His opera  GETTYSBURG, which featured an all American cast, premiered in 1938 at the Hollywood Bowl to unprecedented critical acclaim. Due to the fact that the opera premier was broadcast Nationally, newspapers across the Country proclaimed: " Brilliant! Riveting! A Triumph!" Morris Ruger was on the faculty of San Bernardino College and died in California, in 1974 at age 72.  While involved with President Roosevelt's "New Deal" Federal Music Project, which kept people in The Arts working during the Depression, Ruger became friends with a noted California artist, Francis Atlee "Frank" Caldwell.  Caldwell, who died  at age 85 in 1996 was about 25 years old when he painted the picture of Ruger who was about 34 at the time.  Today, if you are willing to settle for one in a series of five hundred prints of a Caldwell painting, it will set you back about five hundred bucks. An original Caldwell painting is usually a museum piece except for several that are owned by Ruger family members.

My client, Robert Morris Ruger, moved from New Jersey to Washington State in his retirement years to be closer to his family.  Of course, he took the Caldwell painting with him.  When he died in 2010 in at age 83, he willed the painting to his oldest grandson,  Jason Ruger, who was serving in the U.S. Army in Texas.  In the process of settling up the estate, Robert's son shipped the painting from Seattle to Texas, but, due to grief and confusion, forgot to purchase shipping insurance. To make matters worse, the shipper delivered the painting to a wrong address that was six blocks away from where Jason lived.  Since the item was not insured no signature was required. The painting was left on the porch of an apartment house.  The shipper provided Jason with the mistaken address, but, denied any other responsibility.  No one at the wrong address admitted to seeing the package.  The Ruger family was heartsick.  Some speculated that since the package looked similar in size and shape to a big screen TV, a thief simply spotted it unattended on the porch and absconded with it.  This theory proved to be largely correct.

Jason Ruger made up fliers which featured a description and photograph of the lost painting and posted them in store windows and on utility poles for many blocks around. He wisely did not advertise that the painting was rare or valuable.  The summer and fall passed with the painting still missing.  The Ruger family had almost given up hope when, shortly before Christmas, Jason received a phone call from a women who had found the painting.  She was the landlady of an apartment house situated across the street from the address where the painting was mistakenly delivered.  A couple who rented from her fell behind in their rent and moved out in the middle of the night .  While cleaning out the apartment the landlady found the painting stashed in a closet.  Fortunately, she had saved one of Jason's fliers and contacted him.  She declined Jason's offer of a reward.  The painting had been mishandled by the thieves and had to be restored at a cost of $1500.00, but, it is now happily back in the hands of the Ruger family who refers to the entire incident as "our Christmas miracle

SPECIAL THANKS to Cynthia Steinberg, Robert Ruger's daughter, for relating the preceding story to me and aiding in my research. Cynthia and her husband David have been tuning clients for many years and their son carries on the family tradition of great piano playing.
                                                                                                                                                                                                        

CHRISTMAS TRAINS TO THE RESCUE!

Many years ago I had a piano tuning client who had two young daughters taking piano lessons. The girls were doing quite well and their dad had me out to tune and service the piano several times a year. Then, dad lost his job. Every few months I would phone and see if his employment situation had improved and to see if he was ready to have me come out to take care of the piano. Things did not improve as more than a year passed. I called him a few weeks before Christmas and insisted that he allow me to come and take care of the piano at no charge. I knew how much his daughters enjoyed playing the piano and I was also concerned that the instrument was deteriorating. We agreed on a date. When I arrived, he was hard at work decorating the family Christmas tree. We chatted as we both worked at our separate tasks and he told me how much he appreciated my kindness. He shared that his mortgage was many payments behind and that he was hiding his car in a neighbors garage to fend off the repo man. A little later he unpacked a carton containing Lionel trains and began setting them up under the Christmas tree. Being a life long train collector, I immediately noticed that he had some extremely valuable items. I asked him if the trains held any sentimental attachment for him and he informed me that they had belonged to an uncle who years ago gave them to him rather than trash them. I gave him the name and address of a reputable train dealer I knew just a few miles away and urged him to get an offer on the trains. He called me a few days later to tell me he was sending me a check for my piano work because the dealer paid him enough to catch up on all his bills plus a few thousand dollars to spare! Lionel trains had come to the rescue. He called me again just after the new year to tell me that one of the many places he had sought employment hired him and he was back to work.

A CHRISTMAS TALE

We Welsh people love the harp, the National instrument of Wales. I've even seen heavy metal rock groups using harps in place of  keyboards. I am delighted that my granddaughter Verity, an able pianist, took the harp as her main instrument. A dedicated musician, she earned a great deal of the money to purchase her harp herself. As you can see from the photos, she has played for many years and now plays harp professionally.  She, of course, still plays free for our family Christmas Eve dinner.

I seldom get through a Christmas Eve without my mind drifting back to 1979. The phone rang just as we were about to sit down to dinner. A client of mine called to explain that while she and her husband were in the basement wrapping gifts, the kids upstairs got bored and decided to fill in all the spaces between the piano keys with WHITE GLUE! She wanted to know what she should do. I told her that the piano would have to be disassembled and cleaned. I would be right over. Fortunately my brother, also a piano technician, was dining at my home. We pushed our plates aside and rushed out the door. We had to get to those keys before the glue could set. We pulled the piano apart, took out all the keys, washed and dried them, and, reassembled the instrument. The job took many hours and the bill, for two technicians on Christmas Eve, was not for the faint of wallet. The next time I tuned that piano, I noticed the client's children frowning at me and giving me dirty looks. I asked why they were mad at me. They said that on Christmas Day, their parents allowed them to open the presents, then took them away. The gifts were returned to the stores to cover the bill for the piano work. I applauded my clients for great parenting. The kids hate me to this day!