Bio

I received a Bachelor of Music degree from Arkansas State University in 1969 and began a career teaching instrumental music. In 1971, I moved to Baton Rouge, La. and enrolled in graduate school at Louisiana State University to further my studies in music. In 1972, to help finance my education, I started working with a piano technician and learned to tune pianos and do basic repairs. I became the technician for a Yamaha piano dealer and was able to attend the Yamaha school for piano technicians in California. In 1974, I moved back to Arkansas to be the Piano Technician for Arkansas State University. At ASU I took care of 65 pianos including concert grands in 2 recital halls along with teachers studios and practice room pianos.

I joined the Memphis Chapter of the Piano Technicians Guild, taking exams on piano repairs, tuning and regulation. My scores were high enough to achieve the title of Registered Piano Technician, the highest rating. Through the continuing education available in the PTG, I learned to do basic piano rebuilding such as restringing, action restoration, and refinishing. I attended factory workshops at most of the US piano makers and became authorized to do factory warranty work on their pianos.

In 1985, I became friends with a piano designer and we began rebuilding pianos together. I learned from him the basics of piano design. I discovered that disappointments I had with piano tone were caused by traditional piano design. We decided to build a piano that solved most of these design problems. In 1992, we began building pianos in Hoquiam, Washington. While the piano gained a reputation of being one of the best, most musical pianos made, the problems of operating a factory and marketing our piano caused us to change to what we called value added remanufacturing.

Working with grand pianos, some parts-plates and rim bracing- were modified while my partner designed a new soundboard, ribset, bridges, and stringscale. When completed, our remanufactured pianos competed favorably with any new piano. Some of our customers thought our pianos out performed any new piano on the market. Last year I decided that I would return to piano service and recently relocated to the tri-cities.