Tuning forks

[Brian Henselman]

><<"I suspect that the day that I turn over control to a tuning
>
>machine, is the day that I stop learning and improving MY tuning skills.">>
>
>Hmmm  Brian this sounds like me................. several years back :-)
>I am now and always have been an aural tuner and I once thought of ETDs as
>crutches for inadequate skills and techs.  Tain't needfully so!  I was
>convinced by several well respected types :-) to try the thingee, but
mostly
>by the Mad Scientist Dr. AL. He didn't suggest that I buy a SAT but he said
>to me "you don't really know do you?" while I was telling him my opinion of
>all the pitfalls and shortcomings of these evil devices.
>
> I was an adequate tuner before purchasing an SAT and I still am an
adequate
>tuner after SAT purchase but I feel that I am a much better adequate tuner
>than before.  I still tune aurally outside the shop and for fine tunings
>inside the shop, for everything else, i.e. pitch raises, chipping new
>strings, settling in new strings with multiple tunings, etc. I use my SAT.
>
> I also check my tunings/temperament occasionally with the SAT in the shop
>and have lost many arguments with it but I have also won some of them too
>:-).  I still tune the same way as before the SAT but I 'listen'
differently
>and learn something in the process almost everytime I do so, all the while
>arguing with those blinking red eyes that don't particularly care what I
>think!! :-)
>
>  If you have an SAT and allow your skills to deteriorate they will,
however
>if you use the SAT to sharpen and improve your skills it will help you do
>that too, and do so in an incomparable manner.
>Of course this is just the opinion of one recovering aural tuner.
>Jim Bryant (FL)

Jim,

"Sounds" like you have the right attitude.  I agree that a SAT can help
refine a technicians knowledge when used to check aural tuning.  I just
don't want to become a technician who relies so heavily on a machine that
I'm not continuing to refine my skills.

I've seen some technicians really benifit from a SAT, especially when older
age compremises his or her upper frequency hearing.  I've  also believed
that ETD's are perfect for quick shop work.  They even do a good job, if not
better job than aural, when hearing is compremised by background noise.  I
think that one of the strongest benefits in owning an ETD for a shop is that
it would allow an apprentice-type to do "grunt" tuning with a high degree of
confidence,  i.e. chip-tuning.

However, concert tuning is another matter.  I don't think that it is an
accident that most serious artists that perform at our local performance
venues specifically request aural concert tuning.  I've never had someone
call and request an ETD tuning, but I've seen numerous times that I was
called specifically because I won't use an ETD.

Yes, ETD's can and often do a good job, even for concert work.  But no one
is going to convince me that as long as I have good ears, that I should let
a machine do all of the "thinking."  Just my $.02 worth.

Cheers,
Brian Henselman