ETD Question

[Kent Swafford]

on 6/11/00 2:54 PM, Richard Brekne at Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no wrote:
 
> I didnt know about this at all.. I remember reading in a very old edition
> of the Journal a tuning / temperament system developed by Fairchild, but
> this is the first I have heard about an "Aural Tuning Emulator". I wonder
> if you would be so kind as to decsribe this in a little more detail.
> Interesting...

I don't believe the Aural Tuning Emulator has ever been written up in the
Journal. Steve Fairchild spent years developing this system and the early
system that was written up in the Journal was not as advanced as the later
system.

One problem with the system was that I believe that the particular spread
sheet program that Steve used is not one of the now popular ones like XL or
123.

Of course, the biggest problem with the Aural Tuning Emulator would be
taking the data from the piano -- very time consuming. Even the Chameleon
ATE, which was the best hope for bringing the ATE into general availability,
would have taken quite a bit of time to play all the notes into the computer
and crunch the data.

Steve put out some ATE calculated tunings for various specific models of
pianos. These, as Dean points out below, are very good. They are in SAT
format, and are not freely distributable. Dean may (or may not) still have
these available for sale.

Kent

from the pianotech archives:

> Date: Sun, 04 Feb 1996 16:24:00 -0500 (EST)
> From: "Dean L. Reyburn, RPT" <75601.2765@compuserve.com>
> To: pianotech listserver <pianotech@byu.edu>
> Subject: Re: Accu-Tweaker anomoly
> 
> Jim Harvey writes:
>> I've noticed that the LED's on my Accu-Tuner are reluctant to
>> "light up" on a certain note.
> 
> Steve Fairchild has spent some time on this problem, and his conclusion
> is that a much lower set of listening partials work much better.  He
> measured the relative strength of each partial on each note of uncounted
> pianos to come up with this arrangement.  His Aural Tuning Emulator
> program produces tunings that use these partials:
> 
> 6th partial from A0 up to E2
> 3rd partial up to E3
> 2nd partial up to G#4
> 1st partial to top
> 
> This is much lower than FAC or even Chameleon for most of the treble, and
> it solves the above problem completely!  These partials will be loud on
> practically all pianos.  The 3rd partial in the midrange gives nice
> Perfect 5ths (3/2 partial matching).  Notice Steve's layout doesn't even
> use the 4th partial!
> 
> Another side benefit of Steve's partials is that A4 is tuned to the
> fundamental, eliminating any guessing by the machine as to where A440 is.
> Chameleon uses the 2nd partial for this and is always within 1/10 bps,
> but FAC uses the 4th partial, which can commonly be 1/2 or more off!
> (check it some time)
> 
> Steve and I are working on a system called the "Chameleon Aural Tuning
> Emulator".  In this program, the person just plays the notes from A1 thru
> C7 for about 2-5 seconds each.  The laptop computer records the partial
> ladder (all the partials needed to tune) and calculates a tuning using
> Steve's well tested (and incredible) formulae.  The tuning it produces
> may be the first to have a chance at surpassing aural tuning.
> 
> I have used some of Steve's tunings (produced by his DOS/spreadsheet
> Aural Tuning Emulator) with this partial series, and they are first rate,
> and the SAT pattern is always solid.  One caution though, the speed that
> the SAT lites turn at is always proportional to beat speed (NOT cents),
> so the lower the partial, the slower they turn for the same cents error.
> 
> I also have the a beta version of a digital audio spectrograh built into
> my Tuning Manager for Mac program.  The final version of this will
> display the cents offset, and a graph of decibel strength for all
> relevant partials of the note played, right on the screen.  I hope to be
> using this in my class "The Digital-Aural Tuner" at the PTG national, in
> Dearborn in July.
> 
> BTW, if you record aural (or any) tunings directly off a piano, try the
> above partial set, I think you will be pleasantly surprised.
> 
> For those who didn't follow all the partial stuff, try getting your hands
> on the book "On Pitch" by Rick Baldassin, RPT.  The PTG home office
> carries it for $20.  It was my "Rosetta Stone" to make the switch from
> all aural to aural-electronic tuning.
> 
> Dean  


> Date: Tue, 09 Jun 1998 15:00:52 -0700 (MST)
> From: "Jim Coleman, Sr." <pianotoo@IMAP2.ASU.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Direct Interval Tuning
> 
> Hi Dave and the rest of the list:
> 
> You wrote:
> 
> " I'd sure like to see the computer that can make
> judgments whereby moving one note a little sharp or flat improves some
> intervals while compromising others. No such computer or computations
> from one does or ever will replace the human ear."
> 
> Welcome to the real world. It has already been done by Steve Fairchild in
> his Aural Tuning Emulator. He sells his program for $500.00. You have
> options of inputting your own personal preferences as far as Stretch is
> concerned. It considers each note as to how it fits with neighboring 3rds,
> 10ths, octaves, double octaves, octave 5ths etc. and then makes a
> determination as to how closely it can accommodate each of those to the best
> possibility. It takes several iterations of the program to finally
> determine the best location.  Isn't that what we try to do aurally
> except we try to do it in one or two passes?
>