Mark Roth earned a Bachelor of Music
Education degree from Ohio State University in 1992. He began
piano study at age six. In 1987, he was awarded a full tuition
scholarship to the OSU School of Music based on his piano audition
and music theory placement test. At Ohio State, he studied piano
with Rosemary Platt and Nelson
Harper, voice with Mark
Baker, piano pedagogy with Jerry Lowder, vocal pedagogy and
choral conducting with James Gallagher and Maurice Casey, and
string pedagogy with Robert
Gillespie. He played piano for the Men's Glee Club, The Scarlet
and Gray Show, and was accompanist for numerous vocalists and
instrumentalists. Mark sang baritone and bass in the OSU Symphonic
Choir and Men's Glee Club under James Gallagher, and the OSU Chorale
under Maurice Casey. He was music director for The Music Man
(1989) and Guys and Dolls (1991) at the Ritz
Theatre for the Performing Arts in Tiffin, Ohio, and organist
at Ss. Peter and Paul Church in Attica, Ohio (which closed in
2005) for two years. The proudest moments in his musical career
were his graduating piano recital at Ohio State and performing
in the choir on the Atlanta
Symphony Orchestra's CD of Mahler's Eighth Symphony under
the direction of the late choral music legend, Robert Shaw.
Mark has been a piano technician
for the past twelve years, and estimates that he has done over
3000 tunings. Besides music, he enjoys hiking and botany, photography,
visual art, architecture and history, Macintosh, travel, bicycling,
family time, and vegetarian cooking.
It is hard to believe but most piano
tuner/technicians are not pianists as well. My background in classical
music, including five and a half years of college level piano
lessons, allows me to judge the condition of a piano not just
from a technical standpoint, but from the point of view of an
experienced pianist and a trained musician. This additional frame
of reference is a valuable asset when helping a customer get the
most out of an instrument. Someone without this experience would
have difficulty understanding how the technical workings of the
piano are directly related to piano technique and musical expression.
This knowledge is a definite advantage.
