What is a Pitch Raise? Does your piano need a pitch raise?

You may or may not have heard of the term pitch raise before but it is something that is very important when it comes to the condition of a piano. It’s nothing to be scared of but it is something you should be aware of, especially if you are looking into buying a used piano or haven’t tuned your piano in a long time. Maybe you have a piano that you haven’t tuned in years or maybe you just bought a used piano and assume that you’ll just get it tuned up and it will be ready to go. Then when your tuner arrives he tells you that you’re going to need a pitch raise; what does that mean?

Hundreds of years ago there were no established pitches. For example, an A on one piano would not sound the same as an A on another piano – pitches would vary quite a bit. Over time pitches stabilized and a standard pitch was established. Today the standard reference of pitch is A 440. That is the note that a symphony orchestra tunes to. But what does 440 mean? The number stands for vibrations per second of the strings and it’s the measurement of how many times the string is moving back and forth each second. If you double the vibrations of the string to 880 cycles per second, you also have an A, just one octave higher! It is the same principal for all musical tones.

So why is it a concern if your piano is not up to pitch? There are actually several reasons this:

One of the most common examples is if your piano is under pitch and you are playing with other musicians you will be playing in two different keys and it won’t work. Or at the very least you will be drastically out of tune with one another.

Another fundamental reason to have your piano tuned to concert pitch is that a piano is designed and manufactured to sound best tuned to a certain pitch. So if your piano has dropped in pitch, it will produce a very dull, lifeless sound.

So is it really that complicated to get a pitch raise? Actually, it is! There are a number of reasons why it’s a complicated and expensive procedure.There are about twenty tons of string tension collectively throughout the piano. Getting a pitch raise means that you will be adding potentially thousands of pounds more pressure onto the plate and the delicate wood parts of the piano; particularly the bridges and soundboard which could possibly cause problems. Worse than that, unless a tuner really knows what they are doing, they could end up breaking strings. So if you’re getting a pitch raise you definitely want someone who is experienced in this. Piano technicians must lubricate the points of friction on the strings if there is any corrosion.When you consider that there are over 220 strings on a piano and multiple points of friction, this is a job in itself! If the piano hasn’t been tuned in years the strings could have become tarnished or rusted melding into the pins and other parts of the piano. If you just tune it up you could end up snapping strings if you don’t take precautions.

Even in a best case scenario, if you tune a piano that needs a pitch raise without any major problems, you can’t expect the piano to hold its tuning. In fact, your tuner will have to do a rough tuning first then then do a fine, second tuning. But even the refined tuning won’t hold very long and you will most likely need to get the piano tuned again multiple times over the course of the next year or two just to get it to stabilize and hold its tuning. So how can you know if a piano needs a pitch raise? Luckily it is something that is fairly easy to tell if you have the proper tools. You just need a source of pitch: a tuning fork, a tuner that produces tones, or any instrument that you know is in tune. You can even use a tuning application on your phone! A lot of times the piano will not produce completely different notes – it will most likely be between two notes which still entails getting a pitch raise.

So make sure you keep your piano tuned up to pitch. You will enhance the tone and prolong the life of your piano.