Magic of hammers (?)

I drifted into a Steinway room, where my son had his recital, and tried my all time favorite model B, they all sounded different

I have a very bright-sounding Kawai, and a tech recently mentioned a voicing process of 'steaming,' which evidently can loosen the fibers of the Asian hammers. I'd not heard of that. I looked in my 'Piano Servicing Tuning & Rebuilding' by Reblitz, and see no mention of it there.

Any of you have experience with this?

David

: I drifted into a Steinway room, where my son had his recital, and : tried my all time favorite model B, they all sounded different

Yes, it is true that you can't make a Yamaha sound like a Steinway - and that's about all the truth in the statement. However, it is true that there is a wide variation in sound among Steinways. There are many reasons for that which I won't go into now, but you might compare it with a race car versus a family car. There are a huge number of adjustments that can be made to a race car and it requires that they all be made quite often. A camry handles one way and you can like it or not like it.

The fact is that you can have no idea what the piano is going to sound like in your room until it is in the room. The room acoustics make a huge difference (as they do with hi-fi loudspeakers or any other sound source); different rooms absorb different parts of the sonic spectrum. That's why the final toning has to be done in situ.

That said, there is no way that messing with the hammers will make a Steinway sound like a Yamaha because the Yamaha (excellent instrument that is is for the money) will not offer the singing quality, the brilliant treble or the rich growly bass/tenor register that makes the Steinway what it is. And, of course, vice versa. It comes from the soundboard, the scaling and the case construction.

I've heard it said by piano techs that the felt used in Asian piano hammers has shorter fibres than that of the Renner hammers used in the Steinway and that they tend to break up under the toning needle and yield less controllable or consistent results. I don't know how much truth there is in this but I do know that in my experience it doesn't take long for Kawais and Yamahas to go brittle and nasty unless they are constantly toned. I have personal experience of a cheap ten year old Yamaha small grand in a school that is a very satisfactory musical instrument because it is carefully looked after by an excellent technician who constantly adjusts the action regulation and toning. Most tuners just can't be bothered or don't know how. Steinways seem to survive this treatment better than most makes: even a beat up old Steinway seems to be able to hang on to some of the magic.

The expensive hand-built Yamaha grands are, by the way, a totally different proposition but people don't seem to be generally aware of them. I don't know why they don't market them more effectively because the few that I have encountered are very good indeed (at least when new).

'Steaming the hammers:' the way that I heard it from my recent tuner/tech chat was something like, 'There was a fire, with resulting water damage. It seemed to make the hammers the best-sounding I'd heard.' I didn't get an stats on how many subsequent pianos' hammers were intentionally treated this way...

David

: I have a very bright-sounding Kawai, and a tech recently mentioned a voicing : process of 'steaming,' which evidently can loosen the fibers of the Asian : hammers. I'd not heard of that. I looked in my 'Piano Servicing Tuning & : Rebuilding' by Reblitz, and see no mention of it there. : : Any of you have experience with this? : : David