By Guest Blogger Amy Nutt
When you have a piano, it is very important that you take care of it. When you take care of your piano, it will add beauty and functionality to your home for many years to come. Many pianos are even lucky enough to become family heirlooms.
Caring for your piano also means it will be able to play at its full potential. Over time, a piano may lose its sound, but keeping it tuned up and cleaned up means it will maintain its beautiful sound far into the future.
Here are ways you can take care of your piano:
- You have over 200 strings in your piano that are responsible for the beautiful sounds that it makes. It is very important that you call in a piano technician to keep your piano tuned. They are able to carefully adjust the tension of each string. Make sure you have this done twice per year. Even if the piano is not played, it will still go out of tune.
- If your piano is brand new, make sure it is tuned 3 to 4 times in the first year. The strings have to be stretched in order to be broken in. This can cause the piano to go out of tune more often. You must listen to your piano now and then. You’ll be able to tell when it is out of tune because it goes out of harmony.
- When placing your piano within a room, always make sure it is away from heating ducts, radiators, and anything that emits hot air. This can affect both your tuning and can cause cracks in the wood of the piano. You also want to make sure the piano doesn’t sit in direct sunlight.
- When cleaning and polishing your piano, do not use furniture polish. Simply take a micro fiber cloth and dampen it. Make sure it is wrung out well. If you’re not sure where to find a micro fiber cloth, you can find them in the automotive department of your local department store or at the local auto parts store. You can also use piano polishes, which can be purchased from your local music store.
When cleaning the keys, use a damp cloth on the tops of the keys. If they are hard to clean, you can use a mild soap solution. It is important to make sure no water spills down the sides of the keys and that they are all dried thoroughly.
When cleaning the piano’s interior, it is a good idea to have a technician do that job. There are many parts on a piano that can break, so only a technician should take the piano apart. This is because they know how to handle the parts and put everything back together correctly.
As long as you stick to these maintenance tips, your piano should be a staple within your home for quite some time. It will look beautiful, sound great, and everyone will admire it. If it goes into disrepair, then a magnificent instrument is not getting the fair treatment that it deserves.
So remember that you need to take care of your piano. Although it is expensive and magnificent, it isn’t going to tune itself, clean itself, and it isn’t going to place itself within the correct place within a room. You have to do all of that for it because it is unable to take care of itself. When you’re able to pass your piano down to your children and your children are able to pass it down to your children, you’ll know that you’ve done a good job.
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by Kevin on June 29, 2009
With the computer being able to do so many composites’ in the new era you might wonder should you play live or should you just synthesize every sound needed in the comfort of your own home? Many wonder this every day, with the computer you can make almost any instrument sound with ease and have them play at the same time. If you are considering this alternative, think about the things you can do either way. Playing live means that you can see your audience, but you can’t so much with a computer.
MIDI files are one of the types that are used to simulate the sounds of instruments. As time has progressed, the sounds have become less electronic sounding and more realistic. The MIDI format is mainly used on Mac Pc’s. They use plug ins that are existent, plus you can always download more of them. This makes them appealing to those who just seek to make music using a computer rather than going live.
Virtual Sound Technology is another format that can be used to create live sounds of instruments. The wide variety of instrumentations takes and then loops sounds. Electronic effects can be used in many programs available; there is also a variety that can be added By the Internet. Virtual Sound Technology and MIDI files both convert the files to digital sound. This results is a wide variety for the person using this feature to arrange sounds and ways the music is produced without needing new sounds.
The question then becomes whether or not to move into a recording studio or to produce the label using only the electronic versions. While the electronic versions keep all the same notes and length they also produce the same effect every time. With a live performance this is not always the case, music has to be adjusted based on the instruments used and the notes that are played.
Resonance is one of the main problems however to using a computer to make the music files. Once the sounds are digitalized the sounds no longer carry the waves that an instrument makes in Resonance waves. Resonance waves are vibrations carried from various instruments from the chimes, to even a drum. If you are looking for a little bump to it then you don’t want to digitalize and you will want to use the live performance idea not the production of computer sound files.
Another important choice in this department is choosing the right File to fit the sound you want to make. There are several types of files that can emulate an instrument but if you choose the wrong one fans and even record labels can tell that your sounds are made from a computer rather than a live band. If you are going for techno or electronic music then any file type will work. If, however, you want a more realistic sound you will need to listen to many files and choose the ones that fit what you want them to do.
If you don’t find the ones that you want right away you can always check for upgrades and check for new add-ons, this will increase the chances that you will find what you are looking for. Selecting the right file may need more time then you initially think because of the effects and sounds you’re looking for.
The main thing to think about is this is your music you can have it play any way you want it to. Selecting the right music for what you want is important. After you have selected the type of music you want played, you will want to add them all together; this can add the full flavor of the music. If it plays how you think it should then you can then keep the file. If, however, it’s not the way you want then you might need to tweak it some and change some of the arrangements of files, or you might need to change a file or two to add the sounds you want.
