Perfect Pitch, ET vs. WT, tone color

[Tom Cole]

JIMRPT wrote:
> 
> In a message dated 12/6/97 3:17:01 PM, you wrote:
> 
> <<Also, does anyone have thoughts on whether or not it is ethical to tune a
> piano for someone in WT instead in ET without telling them first?>>
> 
> David;
>   I suppose that it would be unethical to do this due to the fact that unless
> that persons/students piano was tuned in the same manner as the teachers, the
> sound would never be the same. (not that it is anyway :-)  In addition the
> "standard" practice is ET and that is what I would 'assume' most clients would
> want on their piano.  But that brings up Jim C's "pure fifth" tuning and that
> is not ET either is it ?
>  I don't know; I get confused so easily.....
> Jim Bryant (FL)
> .-

Jim,

I believe JC Sr.'s "pure fifth" tuning is very much equal temperament.
If every fifth is widened to pure then every fourth is very wide and all
the octaves are stretched to the max and equally so. Octave stretch is a
variation, shall we say, on ET. To say it another way, if you change the
Stretch Factor numbers on an SAT, you still have ET, n'est-ce pas?

I agree that putting a WT on a customers piano seems unethical, at least
from the tuner's perspective. We know we've done something out of line.
My experience with a number of musicians, never mind non-musician
owners, is that they wouldn't know a/an historical temperament was put
on their instrument unless it had a noticeable enough wolf interval to
tip them off at some point. How many non-techies are
temperament-educated, after all? But if I suspect a customer to have
anything close to a good ear, I would not stray from ET unless
requested. 

I learned to tune a quasi WT on spinets. Since you can't put a totally
successful temperament on such a piano, you might as well make it sound
good in the "easy" keys and so I used to, as a strictly aural tuner,
tune the white key thirds so that they beat slower than the rest. As
long as the unisons and octaves sounded good and as long as Uncle Harry
doesn't come over and play Silent Night in G# major, you're cool. Yow, 8
sharps! :-o

-- Tom

Thomas A. Cole, RPT
Santa Cruz, CA