The Pianoforte Tuners' Association 1913-2013

This 219,733 word book is really three works in one. In the main section we are taken from the exciting beginning of the British Pianoforte Tuners’ Association, with their world-famous President who is revered, even today, by many music lovers every summer in the UK; through the very shaky times of World War Two; to the climax of their triumphant centenary celebration in 2013. After several appendices containing lists of PTA people, positions and events, we come to two more large sections. The first of these is Gill Green’s fascinating dissertation on the rise of professional piano tuning through the 18th and 19th centuries, setting the stage for the launch of the PTA. The second is the 1872 day-by-day diary of an Australian piano tuner, which not only reveals the problems faced by piano tuners of the time, but the kind of life experienced by the early pioneers who emigrated to the other side of the world. A book for everyone interested in the piano, this presents a unique insight in an aspect of the instrument not previously available.