I have to ask out of curiosity, does this mean you worked full-time tuning harpsichords or rather that you did a lot of e.g. piano tuning and also occasionally tuned harpsichords? I'm hoping the former but expecting the latter.
I was a student at the time, and harpsichord tuning was a side job (~10 hours/week). My big "competitive advantage" over piano tuners was that I was very much into playing baroque music and knew a lot about unequal temperaments and harpsichord technology. I could also do pianos (tuning only, no maintenance), and did a few when needed, but harpsichords need tuning once a week plus an extra tune before every concert. For comparison, most pianos tend to get tuned on a several-monthly cadence, so you need a lot more clients to fill up a schedule.
Essentially, instead of a fee for service (like piano tuning) product, harpsichord tuning is a subscription product. However, I think there were <10 other people who tuned harpsichords in the same major metro area, so the market is pretty tiny.
This is all fascinating! Thank you for sharing! If I can keep bothering you with questions (or if you happen to be able to point me to a place to learn more about harpsichord tuning), I have more questions. But I also understand if you don't want to keep answering them! Despite being someone who doesn't know much about nor listen to much music, I've always had a soft spot for harpsichords.
Why do harpsichords need to be tuned so much more frequently? How long did they take to tune (and how does that compare to tuning a piano)? How was the pricing structured with such a regular need? Were most of the harpsichords you were tuning in academic institutions, arts institutions, private use, et cetera? And not a question but another thought, I'm surprised there were even a handful of people tuning them in your metro area!
A sibling comment mentioned that harpsichords tend to have wood frames, and so they are incredibly reactive to temperature and humidity. The pin blocks in harpsichords also are often a single piece of hardwood, while in a piano they are a laminate of specially selected quartersawn hardwoods, so they hold the tuning pins a lot more strongly. If you hire a piano tuner for your harpsichord, they also tend to torque the pins too hard, which weakens the pin block even more.
Depending on the instrument and temperament, a tuning could be ~45 min or up to 90 min. Small instruments in the family (spinets and virginals) could have <4 octaves and one stop, meaning <50 strings to tune, and the biggest instrument had 5 stops and a 5-octave keyboard, meaning more strings than a piano (300 vs about 230). The "standard" instrument is ~4.5 octaves with 3 stops, meaning ~150 strings.
The customer picks the temperament generally, and that has some effect on how long it takes. Quarter-comma tunings (4 fifths flat by a quarter of a comma, the rest remaining pure) like Werckmeister are the quickest, and took under an hour on the standard instrument, but tunings like Kellner (1/5th comma, but harder from an A reference) and Valloti (1/6th comma) took me at least 2 passes to touch up, so over an hour. I also did equal temperament tunings with a tuner, which are quick. For reference, it takes me about 90 minutes to 2 hours to do a piano, so I am a little slow by professional piano tuner standards, but harpsichords are definitely quicker.
I also frequently adjusted the tuning based on what repertoire was being played, rotating it so that the near-pure thirds would be in the keys of the repertoire and possibly raising leading tones a bit. It was also not uncommon to have a modern woodwind in an ensemble, which often meant only doing a slightly spicy version of equal temperament rather than using a full-on baroque tuning.
The harpsichords were pretty much all at schools - I started by tuning my school's instruments and expanded from there.
I generally charged my hourly rate for 4 services/instrument/month + some padding, with extras (concerts) going at an hourly rate. This was a "work study" arrangement at my school (although I had 15 hours/week of work study for <3 hours of work, and still gave them a discount at the standard student rate) and contract work outside.
There's a harpsichord in my family. The traditional harpsichord had a wooden frame, thus the materials just weren't stable.
An American maker, John Challis, developed a harpsichord using modern materials, that stays in tune for much longer.
They didn't take as long to tune, as mentioned above, because the historic temperaments were easier if you knew what you were doing, and there were no unisons (multiple strings per note) to get into agreement. Before the age of the modern piano, keyboard players had to tune their own instruments, so it was just part of learning to play.
The Challis harpsichords are fascinating, but I think also a bit of an acquired taste. The aluminum parts sound odd to me, but I assume they basically never lose their tuning.
I can finally ask someone this! I was thinking of getting my piano tuned to a spicier temperament, happy for certain keys to be noticeably out as long as other keys sound a bit sweeter.
Anything you'd recommend, or is it a shit idea on piano?
I would suggest Kellner or Valloti if you tend to play romantic period music, although those are a hair harder to tune than the easy ones like Werckmeister. Pianos can definitely take temperaments as long as you keep the A at 440 (to equalize tension on the harp).
Personally, I think Beethoven and Chopin sound great in Kellner, and I had my piano in Kellner for a very long time.
I have to ask out of curiosity, does this mean you worked full-time tuning harpsichords or rather that you did a lot of e.g. piano tuning and also occasionally tuned harpsichords? I'm hoping the former but expecting the latter.