[pianotech] What is bloom,

[John Delacour]

At 09:07 -0700 17/03/2011, Nicholas Gravagne wrote:

>JD's experience with playing chords and then lifting dampers at the
>pedal, although related to the above, is different in that the vast
>majority of damped strings are suddenly activated through mechanical
>coupling and sympathetic vibration upon lifting the dampers.

Ah, well in that case you're changing the subject, Nick!  You are 
talking about the way an individual note attacks, decays, sustains 
etc.

>Given this sense of things, all decent pianos have some bloom. But the
>best of the lot have it more so. Bloom to some may simply be defined
>as very fine piano tone, and not necessarily anything beyond that.
>Certainly not magic.
>
>Voicing plays a big role here as well, but that's another story...

Toning (voicing) is very pertinent, as you say, in the way the sound 
envelope develops and decays.  It is quite astonishing how the sound 
of a note can be transformed from a thoroughly unsatisfactory, jagged 
curve to something acceptable, regular and longer-sustained.

But I'll stop there because I was not talking of the more frequently 
encountered phenomenon that you have begun talking about.  My 
question is about the bloom that occurs in a very small minority of 
pianos when the dampers are raised, and this is an 'extra', allowing 
the player to use effects that are not available on most of even the 
very best pianos.  A piano without it can nevertheless be an 
excellent piano, and a piano with it might not have necessarily have 
certain other desirable qualities.

JD