What you are is what you hear

[Oorebeek A.]

Dear Colleagues,

I just came home from friends where I had spent a pleasant evening. =
My wife, who is in Belgium for a couple of days, needed the car, so I =
had to take the bus to my friends who live outside Amsterdam.
On my way back home in the bus, I was thinking about "the perfect =
tuning" discussion we had this afternoon (GMT), and the thought =
suddenly came to my mind that there was something in relation to this =
subject, that I had not mentioned to you yet.
I therefore made myself a nice cup of tea and write my last lines of =
the day now.

What I wanted to describe to you is a precious moment I had during my =
last ordeal in Hamamatsu.
In other emails to the list I have told about the daily tuning test =
where, after each tuning, the instructor enters "the box" to make the =
tuning graph together with the student. The instructor measures =
electronically, calls out the plusses and the minusses, and the =
student makes a chart of his own tuning result.
After having finished one such a tuning test, my teacher made a =
gentle compliment about the outcome. He then mentioned, that I should =
not strike the keys so hard in the process of tuning. In other words; =
don't bang too much!
I answered that I pounded the keys, out of fear that a pianist would =
otherwise kick my foundation to ruins in only 5 minutes!

The teacher then asked me to first listen to a couple of tones and =
imprint the sound in my ears.
Next, he ordered me to re-tune the left and right strings of each =
unison (of said keys) but this time >not< to strike too hard.
I did as he said, and to my utter amazement these same notes sounded =
>completely< different, they were richer, warmer and more saturated.
We both became enthusiastic and he asked me to give all other unisons =
the same treatment, which I gladly did. After I had finished this =
task, there was a completely different and truly beautiful concert =
grand.....

The explaination for this is that when we strike hard, we hear a =
different series of overtones more prominently than when we strike =
less hard.

The next day I applied this new procedure on a fresh tuning test and =
I was full of inspiration.
I flew over the strings like a jet, I gave all I had... and the chart =
proved this ; a beautiful straight line with hardly any major errors.
A high (daily) score on the door of my box and that day (only) the =
other (japanese) students walked by my door like blazing cats! PAH!

This time, the teacher made a remark about "my tone" being very nice. =
I did not understand him right away because, and this I told him, =
"the instrument has a nice tone...not me...how can this be"? (but I =
was secretly mollified of course...)
He asked me to follow him and we went out of the "box" to get the =
other students, and we assembled around one of the other concert =
grands.
Here he asked each of us to tune three tones, two fifths =
together..like a-e-b, a#-f-c, etc. resulting in five sets of double =
fifths.
Again, the outcome was significant...because each set had a distinct =
different nature!

The teacher even had us each tune the same tone over and over, and =
with each student the tone had a different color!

The explaination comes to this;
As each of us has a different fingerprint, so does each individual =
have a different "hearingprint" resulting in a different tone.

All these phenomena are related to how we "listen to" and "judge" our =
"own" piano sounds and those of numerous others...
And that makes it even more complicated to come to a "perfect" result.




Friendly Greetings from:

CONCERT PIANO SERVICE
Andr=E9 Oorebeek
Amsterdam, the Netherlands
email address: oorebeek@euronet.nl

=89 Where Music is no harm can be =89