[CAUT] Tuning a Bluthner

[Susan Kline]

>Apparently the dealer indicated to the customer that special 
>considerations of some sort were required when tuning a Bluthner, so 
>they needed a tech who had the correct training and equipment.


Equipment? <grin> An extra rubber mute ....

It's simple, really, just mute off three of the four strings (using 
two rubber or felt  wedges), then add in the other two main strings 
while still keeping the fourth muted off. Then pluck the fourth, get 
it roughly in tune with the main unison, and tweak it a little till 
you get the best resonance and timbre. Pluck one more time to be sure 
it hasn't strayed off the main pitch. Once you've done the 
four-string section, it doesn't hurt to listen to each note carefully 
again, and reset any that don't match or have changed. After you've 
tuned the piano a few times it should settle in and not need babying.

It was my experience doing repeated tuning of new Bluethners for a 
two-piano seminar lasting a few days, that once you get the fourth 
string really set in tune, it almost seems to act as some kind of 
tuning reservoir to keep the others from straying under heavy 
playing. Just get it all set up solid and true as you can, and it 
seems to acquire extra stability over ordinary unisons.

Thinking about the fourth string as I tuned them over and over, it 
seems to me that Bluethner didn't add it to get more volume. Rather, 
if you listen to the first three without the fourth, the timbre sort 
of goes white, like when really clear strings are tuned EXACTLY to 
each other? They seem to cancel out some of each other's sound? And 
then you add the fourth, and the sort of messy front termination adds 
a little bit of wildness to it all, so it sings.

Susan Kline
OSU, Newport Arts Center





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