No.2 SAT tuning comps.

[Jim]

To the list:

				Arizona Tuneoff No.2

In the second class at the Arizona State Seminar there were fifteen
selections played similarly to the 17 tests in the first class.  However,
the position of two of the pianos was different.  In this class the left
and center pianos were switched in position so that if there WERE any
advantage of position, this would be shown.

The standard SAT FAC tuned piano was now in the corner and the U1 which
was tuned with the extreme stretch was now in the center.  The Well
tempered piano was still on the right.

The octave playing, the chords, and the arpeggios were pretty much the
same, but some of the other selections were different such as when one
of the attendees, Ramsay, played some Poulenc and Charlie Jacobson
played some ragtime.

At the bottom of the score sheets was an area for suggestions for the
instructor.  One suggestion which came up more than once was that if we
had all of the selections played on Yamaha Disklavier systems the possible
variation of performance could be eliminated.  Perhaps in some future test
this could be arranged.

Here are the results of the second test:

Left piano       Center piano      Right piano      Can't tell
FAC Standard     High Stretch      Well Temp.       who knows?

102              56                60               7


One thing which is obvious is that this second class was more decisive in
that there were only 7 cases where they could not decide which piano sound-
ed the best.

The surprising thing is that the piano in the corner in both cases received
the highest score.  This shows that position is very important in any such
test as this.  A more perfect test might be to have any test pianos mounted
on a rotating stage so that when played they would be in the same position
namely front and center.

If one compares the left piano between the voting of the two classes, then
the standard FAC tuned piano comes off the winner.  My personal preference
was for the higher stretched piano, but it IS possible that I could be
wrong.  When one compares the right piano with the center piano, in both
cases the Well Temperament comes out ahead, but more so when compared to
the higher stretched tuning in the second test. The higher stretched tuning
was more or less patterned after the Virgil Smith style of tuning. Perhaps
when I go up against Virgil Smith in Orlando, I should just stick to the
standard FAC type tuning because when one compares the corner piano tuning
of the first test (higher stretch) with the FAC tuning of the second test,
the standard FAC tuning won by a higher margin.  For those of you who use
the SAT, take heart, it's a pretty good tuning style.  Some of us who also
tune aurally, tend to think that we can spread the temperament octave a
little better than the standard FAC tuning.  This test does not seem to
bear that out.

For those of you who like to tune historical temperaments, it is not
surprising that you do so well with your clients.  This test shows that at
least one Well temperament can hold its own with other tunings.

Jim Coleman, Sr.