I found Roger after a long search .. and now that the repair and restoration work has been done, I realize what I found.
My 20 year old Bosendorfer concert grand started life as a thing of beauty, visually, aurally and tactilely, and my daughter and I both took lessons and played it for 10 years. Then she grew up, moved away, and no one played it anymore. I did everything wrong - I let it sit idle for years and it was sitting in the sun (ouch!).
I cringed when visitors came to the house, saw the name and instrument and wanted to sit down and play. It had lost just about everything - it was hopelessly out of tune, the keys did not return level, and the area above the keyboard was crazed with sun damage.
I kept postponing doing something because every time I searched, there did not seem to be a viable solution. The Bosendorfer dealer I purchased it from had closed shop, and the other dealers were in far flung states. I was investigating shipping it to place to a place in the South, with a hope and a prayer, thinking how much is this going to cost for shipping and repair, and what can they realistically do?
After one more try searching the local options, I read Roger's website and thought, well I'll call and see what he says. He was low key and professional, seemingly more interested in the piano itself than his fee for services. He came over to my house, and it was the same Roger as the one on the phone - more interested in fixing the piano than his fee. He never treated this as a business proposition, more as an art, perhaps a lost art, certainly a hard to come by art.
He gave me options and expected costs - instate repair at his shop by a recognized refinishing expert (who would come in from another state), or shipping parts back to the Bosendorfer factory in Austria for refinishing, and he would do the "touch/sound/recalibration" work himself.
I had no idea whether it would work and to his credit, Roger never pushed. It was my decision, and he would do his best. I made my election and Roger arranged everything else- it went out the 5th floor window via crane, parts were shipped to the factory in Austria, and Roger set to work restoring the sound.
It came back in the same window, a few months later. I was actually afraid to play it .. it did look beautiful, but how would it sound? Then my daughter came home a few days later, opened up the piano, sat down and started to play. It was back - Roger had done it! The piano sounded like it's original self! And to a mother, there is not better sound than hearing your child play the piano.
I cannot thank Roger enough, nor endorse him enough. It is rare that you meet someone of his caliber in life.
T. Hendricks (Boston MA) read more