---------------------- multipart/mixed attachment Richard and list, I find it very interesting to read your comments regarding "taste"= =20 in tuning. It's long been an opinion of mine that the instrument itself=20 dictates how it should be tuned. While various octave stretching practices= =20 are used it would seem that something is always compromised in some way.=20 Every time I have strayed from what I've always done aurally and now in=20 combination with TuneLab something just isn't right to my ears. Much debate= =20 could be done on this issue of taste I am sure. I'll be interested to hear= =20 what comes of this. Greg At 03:55 PM 5/12/2003, you wrote: >Phil & All, > >Phil Bondi wrote: > >"In my opinion, the larger and better scaled the piano, the more options=20 >you have for stretching and narrowing, depending on taste" > >This is an interesting statement and gets at the heart of what I'm trying= =20 >to explore. First of all it's my belief that the better the piano, the=20 >more clearly the physics of the scaling comes through and hence the more=20 >clearly the piano itself dictates what it wants. "Taste" has very little= =20 >to do with it, in my opinion. With the sophisticated aural checks, and=20 >ETD's available to professional piano technicians, it seems to me that it= =20 >should be possible to define a standard for concert grand tuning that=20 >minimizes resorting to "taste". > >My arguement against using customer or even technicians' "taste" as a=20 >criteria is that it's so vague. I think it opens the door for=20 >imprecision. If I ask whether a person tunes pure 5ths in the center of=20 >the piano, that seems to me to be a fairly precise parameter and it has=20 >consequences when tuning the upper and lower extremes of the piano. If I= =20 >ask whether a person likes the 3rds, 10ths, and 17ths to increase in speed= =20 >by an amount equal to the difference between similar temperament thirds,=20 >then that seems like a precise way of describing how the 3rd, 10th and=20 >17th compare. Unfortunately most technicians say they have to get faster,= =20 >and leave it at that, end of description. > >Using just those basic tools above, takes the tuning to the last octave=20 >and 1/2. If I ask whether a person tunes the last octave and 1/2 using=20 >pure 4:1 double octaves, that again is fairly precise, especially if one=20 >uses an ETD set to match the double octave below. Tuning the double=20 >octave with a treble stretch as descrbed above, seems to me to be the=20 >widest stretch that a piano can accomodate and be consistently tuned.=20 >There simply are no good checks for the last 1/2 octave 7 other that 17ths= =20 >and double octaves. Checks that rely on triple octaves and arpeggios=20 >don't seem to me to be as accurate and therefore make the top octaves=20 >inconsistent. In addition tuning octave 7 as pure double octaves to the=20 >notes below octave 7, enhances the singing area of the piano because the= =20 >notes in octaves 4 & 5 are supported by sympathetic strings in octave 7. >In terms of satisfying customers' "taste" what is that? If a person=20 >doesn't tune professionally, what real criteria are there for "taste?"=20 >Without an accurate description of a set of tuning criteria, what is taste= =20 >but guesswork. Using "taste" as a criterion opens pandoras box to=20 >untrained ears who, like untrained artists, can say, "I don't know=20 >anything about art, but I know what I like." Or there will be technicians= =20 >who develop their own "standard" in the vacuum of no standard. > >What a person does with smaller grands, spinets and consoles is one thing= =20 >(we all know there are often big compromises that have to be made), but=20 >concert grands announce how they want to be tuned. At least that's my=20 >thesis here and I'm trying to find out if I'm a lone wolf on this, or=20 >whether we can really determine a more clearly defined concert grand=20 >tuning that doesn't rely on "taste." > > >Richard West > > >_______________________________________________ >caut list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives > Greg Newell Greg's piano Fort=E9 mailto:gnewell@ameritech.net=20 ---------------------- multipart/mixed attachment--
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