HT's

[Billbrpt]

In a message dated 98-03-13 05:47:46 EST, you write:

<< So after reading Jorgensesn's work I am left asking myself "what is the
 best tuning for the average customer" (average defined above).  Will the
 improved harmony in the simpler keys in a Victorian or other HT, bring out
 the best in what is being played on the average home piano?  Could this
 really be the right solution for maximizing the musical experience of the
 'average' player?
  >>
You are right on the money, in my view.  Those who feel they MUST make an
Acrosonic have pure 5ths in favor of strained, fast and still uneven 3rds are
just missing the boat, entirely.  They are making the instrument sound "sour"
to virtually everyone who plays it.

This is not to say that advanced players on fine instruments don't like and
appreciate the Victorian and other HT's too.  You find only a very few,
occasional professional artists who are truely adapted to ET and find anything
else unacceptable.  Unfortunately, we hear from the technicians who service
those kinds of clients the loudest, clearest and most often.   Red-faced and
white lipped, they insist that ET and ET only is the norm.  Anything else is
an archaic curiosity and to offer it as a "piano tuning" to a customer without
"full disclosure" and giving the customer a choice between the "archaic
curiosity" and the "normal" ET is unethical.  This is, of course, nonsense and
it is certainly not the view held by all.  Perhaps it is a view held by only a
few.  It is simply they who voice their opinion with candor.  In my Chapter,
even those who only tune in ET do not hold the view that using HT's is
unethical.  It is simply one technician's style vs. another's.

We do not all need to tune every piano as if we were a Steinway Hall
technician working in Carnegie Hall.  I am glad that you have come to this
conclusion.  I came to it about 10 years ago and renounced ET entirely just
about 1990. The year 2000 will be my 10th anniversary where I can proudly
proclaim that I have not tuned a piano in ET in 10 years.  If only those who
strain away attempting ET and ET with pure 5ths only to end up with Reverse
Well would slap themselves in the face and realize what they are actually
doing,  many a piano would produce far sweeter music.

Bill Bremmer RPT
Madison, Wisconsin