Fork or Float

[Bill Ballard]

On 9/4/96, MHoffman11@aol.com rote:
<< <However, just so that seasoned techs can talk within earshot of the
young'uns with less experience, I'll state that any floating I do is
under the strict guidelines.">  (quoting Bill Ballard)
I resent this and think your attitude stinks.  Can people on this list
disagree without "namecalling" or "pecking order" rear it's head?  (I've
got more than you do...nah, nah.)>>

Thanks for your response, Mike (in all seriousness and with mutual respect
due). I am glad for the chance to restate more clearly what may have been
obscured by the language of an over-active imagination. I was also glad
to clear up any misunderstanding that  the old "Tune it in the Fall and
then again in The Spring" is not a federal mandate, but just longstanding
convention wisdom (just how wise, we're discussing here. Larry Fine's
"Piano Book" has  pertinent insight on this.)

I made that comment about talking candidly "within earshot of the
young'uns", because of an issue having nothing to do with who's green and
who knows it all. In this disucusion about adhering to the pitch
standard, there's an element of "Do as I say, not as I do". It was there
in '93 when the-PTJ editor Jim Harvey was deciding whether the Journal
should run an article which said that allowing the pitch to float (even
15 cents either direction) had little effect on a piano's inharmoncity or
tone quality, and that when the weather has a piano on a yo-yo, it's
probably better for the piano and the tuning not to drag the piano back
to A440. He knew that in an organisation which made A440 its standard of
honor (that we were honor-bound to maintain pianos at A440), such an
article would cause plenty of grumbling and muttering in the background,
and possibly even a few letters in his mailbox. But he also knew that the
business of pitch floating was certainly more widespread than anyone care
to admit, and that now was as good a time as any for the matter to appear
in print.

So when the subject came up again, I had no idea who  among the lurkers
would be the old crusties would be seething "what's this business coming
to, in my day A440 was the law", or the beginning student s saying "What
a relief not to have to worry about  nailing these tunings to the fork".
I was  careful to qualify my remarks about the practice of floating with
the strict guidelines, which I do use. Unfortunately, what was supposed
to be a version of John Kenneth Galbraithe's  wry "What we teach our
young" (refering to the obselescence of large portions of the law of
supply and demand), came off as quite condescending. Oh well, it wont be
the first time that an internet text transmission failed to deliver irony.

I think, Mike, that as we review our posts to this thread we're finding
that, regardless of how we side up on the issue of the pitch standard,
we both doing the  same thing during a day's work.

I'm faxing you two pints of Ben&Jerry's Cherry Garcia ice cream.
(Vermont's Finest.) Enjoy it in Good Humor.

Mr. Bill

Bill Ballard RPT
NH Chapter

"We mustn't underestimate our power of teamwork." Bob Davis---