newbie questions: stretching

[Richard Brekne]

Grin... here we go again with expressions like "beatless" and "natural stretch".
Always fun eh ??

John...I suggest you get a copy of Tunelab and a portable computer and start
"looking" a bit closer at what you can hear.... beatwise. You might suprise
yourself at how interesting this whole buisness really is, how much you can
learn, and you most certainly will find some answers to questions like you pose
about oversized octave plus quints.

Also.. I personally have no trouble hearing... and being distracted by... the
third partial way up in the treble top. Its quite possible to tune a 6:3 octave
type by ear and come very close to pure on the type. Dont discount those high
partials toooooo awfully easily.

Otherwise I have a lot of sense for where you are comming from... sounds much
like our Virgil... I would like to point out that there is much to be learned
from looking closer at both approaches. Pick the partials apart and put them
back together.

As far as what you can hear and what you can not.... I think its more a matter
of what you decide to pay attention to or not. In the long run you can learn to
hear just about anything the piano is capable of pumping out if you pay close
enough attention.

Not that its neccessary to do any of this to be an excellent tuner mind you....
but it is very interesting and enlightening.

my take anyways..

John Meulendijks wrote:

> When I get the impression I get to low with my highest treble side, I tune
> beatless over three or even four!! octaves. I check if it is beatless in the
> upper octave,
> and it mostly is. So what is all this talk about stretching. I blame the
> fysicist who published the results of his research saying that the frequency
> of a upper partial is more than twice, three times etc. You cannot hear
> that. Because it is all in the system incorporated. You don't need to
> stretch to make it fit. When it fits it is stretched. You cannot hear it. So
> actually I blame all the followers of fashion.
> On the other hand: you can make a deliberate choice to do so because then
> you have something to talk about. Some musicians want you to do it, but I
> never came across one who said that my treble side was to low. So I never
> needed to do so. And again in my opinion I don't strech the treble side.
> In the bass it is of some importance to my opinion. Because I experience
> mean sounding intervals as a result of clean octaves. I.e. the quint (fifth)
> and the 5+8. When I stretch to much in the bass I get dirty 10th's. So how
> can I match this with your question?? I prefer in the contrabas very
> beatless octaves, because this is often the way they are played. And above
> all I don't want for example F'-a to be more fast than F-a. It spoiles the
> feeling of the root of a chord. But attention: my last check is A''-a,
> Bb''-Bb etc. And Most of the time I don't hear beats. So I only have focused
> on stretching, but not really doing it (I mean upon above the natural
> stretch that you can't hear.) What puzzles me is that I have the impression
> that the octave plus quint gets oversized in the lower bass, without beats
> in the octaves.
>
> John Meulendijks
> Tilburg, the Netherlands.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Charles Neuman <cneuman@phy.duke.edu>
> To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
> Sent: Monday, February 12, 2001 4:03 PM
> Subject: newbie questions: stretching
>
> > Is stretching the high treble an art or science? That is, do you balance
> > the single and double octaves by whether or not it "sounds good", or do
> > you go by a specified amount of stretch in cents? I've heard both
> > opinions.
> >
> > If it's more of an art, I would imagine there are those who favor the
> > single octaves and those that favor the double octaves. Is this the case?
> > Also, do performers ever specify the amount of stretch they like?
> >
> > As for the bass, I'm finding that if I tune the bass notes at other than
> > beatless octaves, it sounds muddy and out of tune. But then I get those
> > horrible sounding 10ths, which I know I should expect. Any advice on
> > balancing these two problems?
> >
> > Thanks,
> >
> > Charles Neuman
> > Plainview, NY
> >
> >

--
Richard Brekne
RPT, N.P.T.F.
Bergen, Norway
mailto:Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no