I get this question all the time; can you replace the soundboard on your piano?

The simple answer is yes.

However, you have to consider a number of factors when answering this question.

Replacing the soundboard requires removing the strings, the plate, and rebuilding the piano – which already costs thousands of dollars. Replacing the soundboard will then cost additional thousands of dollars; it’s going to be an incredibly expensive undertaking.

But more importantly, what makes the tone of a piano? What makes piano sound like a Steinway, or a Baldwin, or a Bluthner? To a great extent, it’s the soundboard.

In Europe if you replace the soundboard on a piano you are legally not allowed to put the name of the original manufacturer on the instrument.

You also have to take into account that the results you have after replacing the soundboard might be dramatically different than the original piano. If you are going to get this job done, you will need to find someone who is very experienced at it. There are a very few belly men (technicians specializing in soundboard repair) who do excellent work replacing soundboards.

It is more a repair for a piano that is incredibly special or expensive, such as a concert grand Steinway or Bosendorfer that has a soundboard in really bad shape but is still worth restoring.

Bottom line is, if you are going to replace a soundboard prepare to spend tens of thousands of dollars and definitely hire the best people you can find – it’s a repair that can make or break the piano.

At Living Pianos we find pianos with soundboards that are in good shape so these American and European pianos can be brought to their original glory and still be offered at a reasonable price.

If you have any questions about replacing a soundboard or a specific piano you are considering this repair for, feel free to contact me or leave a comment on the blog.

This question comes from one of our viewers Elizabeth from Cozumel in the Caribbean.

She asks, “What can I do about the extreme humidity where I live?” when it comes to her piano.

There are several things you can do to help alleviate the problem of humidity or climate when it comes to the life of your piano.

Buy a Dehumidifier

Install the dehumidifier and make sure that you keep all the windows closed.

You can also use Air Conditioning to do pretty much the same thing.

However, if you are living near the beach or somewhere where you want to enjoy the elements, you might have second thoughts about keeping your windows closed. After all, you have to balance the enjoyment of your life with the longevity of your piano.

But is there anything you can do other than close everything up? Sure.

Close Your Piano at Night

At nighttime when the marine layer comes in, that is the worst time of day for your piano.

This shouldn’t just be something you do if you live near the beach either. Generally, closing your piano at night is a great idea to prolong the life of the instrument.

Buy a String Cover

With excessive humidity it might be a good idea to buy a string cover.

This is a piece of felt that will match the shape of the inside of your piano. It will cover the strings and protect them from humidity without affecting the sound too much.

Put a Cover over the Entire Piano

If you want to protect the piano even more, you can close the entire piano and put a cover over it to prolong the life of the instrument.

But if you want the enjoyment of having your piano open a good deal of the time and still protecting it, there is one thing that might be the right solution for you.

Install a Dampp Chaser System

This is a very interesting way to prolong the life of your piano and still be able to enjoy it’s beauty without having to close it or cover it.

This technology puts heating rods beneath the piano with a humidistat. Whenever the humidity gets above a certain level, the heating rods will become hot.

This will help to keep your soundboard stable and will make tuning more stable over time.

Bottom line, just make sure that no matter what you do to prolong the life your piano, you are able to get the enjoyment out of it that you want.

Just the sound of it, can you imagine the perfect piano? The truth is a perfect piano is a goal. It’s like one definition of infinity where you can go half way to something again and again forever. The secret is getting ahead of the curve so that your piano improves over time.

There’s a saying among piano tuners that you can’t tune an out of tune piano. And there’s some truth to that. When a piano drops pitch, tuning different registers flexes the soundboard altering previously tuned notes.

Perform regular maintenance and you may approach the perfect piano!

When listening to some of the great pianists of all time like Horowitz and Rachmaninoff, sometimes the fast finger passages sound almost jewel-like in the shimmering clarity of the notes. One of the secrets to developing this kind of technique is practicing slowly with raised fingers. You see, it is not just the placement of the attacks of the notes that creates this pristine evenness, it is the precise release of notes that gives the even spacing that creates the trademark sound that is so beautiful.

Try putting your fingers on a table and lifting each finger separately. You will notice how difficult it is lifting up individual fingers, particularly the 4th finger. By practicing slowly with raised fingers, you will develop the strength of the release of notes which will enable you to get that glistening stream of even notes in your fast passage work that is so compelling.

The heart and soul of your piano is its soundboard. Like the top of a Stradivarius violin, the soundboard is the wood beneath all the strings and plate of the piano which gives it its unique quality of sound. There are certain things you should know about soundboards:

• Tight cracks usually present no problems.
• Crown, the slight upward arching of the soundboard is essential for good tone.
• The ribs beneath the soundboard must be firmly attached at all points to avoid buzzing.
• Soundboards can be fixed, but only by removing the strings and plate and rebuilding the piano.

Watch the video to learn how to check the soundboard on your piano.

In a perfect world, you would have a tuner living next door and they would come over every day and keep your piano in tune. Because pianos start going out of tune right after being tuned simply by being played. How often you should tune your piano depends upon several factors:

• Stability of the environment
• How much the piano is played
• Level of refinement required

A new piano or newly restrung piano requires more tuning than one that has been tuned regularly for a long period of time. As a general rule, a piano should be tuned whenever there is a change in seasons. Certainly when going from heat to air conditioning and visa versa necessitates tuning even if the piano sounds O.K. This is because the entire piano may shift slightly up or down. It’s important to develop consistency. If you tune your piano regularly, eventually it will become quite stable. So, like changing the oil in your car, regular tuning is preventative maintenance for your piano.

If you play the piano even casually, you probably know that the sustain pedal on the right makes all the notes you play hold until you release the pedal. The other 2 piano pedals are not as clear cut. In fact, only the sustain pedal operates on upright pianos. The other pedals do various things, but seldom what they are designed to do. Even some grand pianos pedals don’t operate the way they are intended.

The left pedal, sometimes referred to as the soft pedal is actually called the une corde pedal for “one string”. Indeed, early pianos had 2 strings for each note and the une corde pedal shifted the action so that the hammers only struck one string. Modern pianos have 3 strings for each note throughout most of the piano. So the une corde pedal shifts the action so that the hammers strike only 2 of the strings squarely. This is significant because it not only makes the notes quieter, but if offers a change of timbre. Upright pianos usually offer a soft pedal that changes the feel, not the sound. It does this by shifting the hammers closer to the strings making it harder to play loud.

The middle pedal is seldom used and even more seldom understood. Most pianos didn’t have functioning sustenuto pedals as they are called until the end of the 19th century. Many European piano manufacturers didn’t include middle piano pedals until well into the 20th century. Like the sustain pedal, the sustenuto pedal holds notes after you release the keys. The difference is that subsequent notes that are depressed will not hold, only the notes that were depressed when the middle pedal is engaged. This is useful in a few scores of Debussy and other 20th century composers. It’s like having a 3rd hand to hold notes in another register without blurring the harmonies with the sustain pedal. However, the sustenuto pedal is only called upon in 20th century music and very few compositions. It is by no means essential but could be important for someone specializing in 20th century piano music.