[CAUT] Adams 1/4 tone sharp piano

[central]

Eric,
    I wonder what campus risk management / health and safety officers would
say about adding 2200 1bs over normal working load on a 40 year old piece of
equipment.  Even if a dangerous catastrophic event is highly unlikely, it
might not be something any of us should ever do.
    When I was a kid in the 60s, Dad caused a lot of sparks by refusing to
tune drastically sharp for a famous Russian orchestra.  Steinway backed him
up and the university considered it a safety issue and they didn't want
their piano ruined either.  The conductor did back down.  I wonder how many
soundboards, bridges, and strings they managed hurt on that tour.
-Mike Jorgensen


On 3/24/06 11:10 AM, "Wolfley, Eric (wolfleel)" <WOLFLEEL at ucmail.uc.edu>
wrote:

> Since I started this thread, I'll summarize a bit here. Aside from the added
> labor, the major concern with tuning a piano 1/4 tone sharp seems to be that
> there might be some short-term or long-term damage to the instrument. From
> what I can gather, plate breakage is a minor concern. The over-designed
> strength of the plate should easily take the added tension. There was a
> lawsuit here in Cincinnati a number of years back involving a pitch-raise and
> a broken plate and I remember that Jim Ellis contributed some data involving
> the strength of the plate and how it was extremely remote that overpulling
> could break the plate. Jim, if you're reading this and want to set the record
> straight we'd appreciate it. String breakage was also a concern, and having
> now pulled the piano up to pitch it doesn't seem to be a problem. The piano I
> tuned is a 40 year old Baldwin M with the original strings (some spliced in
> the high treble) and there was no breakage. The greatest concern from those
> wh!
>  o know was that the thin wound bass strings would be dangerously close to
> breaking. Breakage here could be a problem on some pianos but obviously wasn't
> a problem on my Baldwin. Long-term damage to the wire and loss of tonal
> quality from overstretching was also mentioned as a concern. I must say that
> it would be hard to tell from listening to my Baldwin because it didn't sound
> too great to begin with but if I notice any degrading (or improvement) of the
> sound I'll let everybody know.
> 
> It took approx. 2.5 hours of work to get the piano to hold at +50 cents. Two
> quick but careful fast passes and one careful one. The piano has those tight,
> jumpy Baldwin pins. I didn't overpull because I just didn't want to tempt
> fate.
> 
> I wonder what piano they used at Lincoln Center when the work premiered. Being
> paid a salary by the state, I can afford to experiment and do the extra work
> but as a private gig I would charge a pretty hefty fee especially since the
> piano will have to be brought back down to normal pitch afterwards.
> 
> Alan, in answer to your question about how sharp I would tune I would say 50
> cents! It wouldn't make any sense to de-tune more...a semitone is just a
> transposition. Any less or more than a quarter-tone (sharp or flat) would
> diminish the effect.
> 
> I also want to say here that I don't mind doing this kind of work. It was an
> interesting experiment and has quite a dramatic musical effect.
> 
> Eric Wolfley, RPT
> Head Piano Technician
> Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music
> University of Cincinnati
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of
> reggaepass at aol.com
> Sent: Thursday, March 23, 2006 12:16 PM
> To: caut at ptg.org
> Subject: Re: [CAUT] Adams 1/4 tone sharp piano
> 
> Hi Eric and List,
> 
>   While we are on the subject of tuning sharp, does anyone out there
> have any general guidelines as to how far sharp they will tune? Of
> course, different pianos are scaled differently, but composers and
> performers alike need to know, as a matter of practical performance
> practice, what is feasible.
> 
>  Thanks in advance for input on this,
> 
>  Alan Eder, RPT
> 
>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: Wolfley, Eric (wolfleel) <WOLFLEEL at ucmail.uc.edu>
>  To: caut at ptg.org
>  Sent: Wed, 22 Mar 2006 17:32:22 -0500
>  Subject: [CAUT] Adams 1/4 tone sharp piano
> 
>  Hi All,
> 
>   I've just had a request to tune a piano ¼ tone sharp for a John Adams
> piece for rehearsals and concert in the next weeks. Can anyone who has
> done this before give me some idea of what I'm in for besides the
> destabilization factor. I'm going to use a Baldwin M we usually let
> people use for prepared piano stuff.
> 
>  Thanks,
> 
>  Eric
> 
>  Eric Wolfley, RPT
> 
>  Head Piano Technician
> 
>  Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music
> 
>  University of Cincinnati
> 
> 
> 
> 
>   
> 
>