Touchweight Customization
Improving the weight and geometry of the piano’s action.
One of the most important – yet widely overlooked – aspects of a piano’s performance is action touchweight. Pianists are well aware of the need to modify their playing technique to accommodate the varying touchweights that are found on different pianos.
Unfortunately, many piano owners also struggle with the touchweight of their own pianos, finding that their hands and wrists tire easily after long periods of playing. Others may find they have difficulty shaping musical phrases and controlling loud and soft dynamics if the action is too light.
What most pianists don’t realize is that action touchweight is entirely customizable and can be adjusted to suit their needs. The action is designed with customized weights in every key, which can be removed or supplemented with additional weights to offset touchweight issues that exist in the action.
Actions that feel heavy, light, or simply uneven from note to note can be evaluated and precisely weighted to within 1 gram of weight resistance from note to note. Other factors that affect touchweight, such as friction, geometry and hammer weight can also be modified to dramatically improve the responsiveness of the action.
If you’ve ever found yourself struggling with your piano’s touchweight, a simple evaluation of the action may be in order. We may very well be able to eliminate these problems for good!
- Action feels too heavy
- Hands & wrists feel tired after playing
- Action feels too light
- Difficult to control dynamics and musical phrasing
- Action feels uneven from note to note
- Hammers or other action components may have been replaced without proper attention to touchweight
