[pianotech] Possible adaptation for the Tuning Exam

[Paul Williams]

That's beautiful!  If one can't hear it, one can't tune it. That's all.
Your descriptions are very clear!  Love it! I don't think Duaine hears it
all that well.  Just my take on it.

Maybe Duanie;I have a take on this? Try this Duaine.  Get your ETD set to
set F-3 and A-3 and hear 7 beats per second. Can you hear the beats? I use
"From Chicago to New York" as my 7 beats per second>  Does that work? Try
it and see what happens.
fromchicagotonewyorkfromchicagotonewyorkwawawawawawawawawawawawawawaww
etc.Just get the groove and see what happens! Let me know if you can hear
that beat going on.Just trying to help bud.



PW

On 11/11/12 4:47 PM, "Encore Pianos" <encorepianos at metrocast.net> wrote:

>Duane:
>
>No one has put it simply enough yet:   You can't tune an acceptable
>temperament or anything else in the piano using a pitch pipe or an octave
>set of tuning forks because of I-N-H-A-R-M-O-N-I-C-I-T-Y, Duane.  That's
>what the others are talking about when they use the word stretch.  Did you
>know that your ETD measures inharmonicity and calculates a tuning with
>algorithms based on those measurements?  That's why the ETD tuning can
>sound
>good, and why a skilled aural tuning can sound good.  It's also the reason
>why when you are at a church you cannot tune a piano to an organ note for
>note.  If you do not have a good working understanding of inharmonicity,
>here's a place to start, Wikopedia.
>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inharmonicity  There's a lot more to it than
>that regarding pianos, but you really need to have at least a basic
>understanding of inharmonicity before you can begin to hold up your half
>of
>an intelligent conversation with others on this list concerning how a
>piano
>is tuned.  If you do not know about inharmonicity or understand it, you
>will
>not understand why the choices that are made by man or machine in tuning
>are
>being made.  
>
>I'll even do some of the work for you, from Wikopedia:
>
>Inharmonicity leads to stretched tuning
>
>When pianos are tuned by ear by technicians called piano tuners, the
>technician listens for the sound of "beating" when two notes are played
>together, and tunes to the point that minimizes roughness between tones.
>Piano tuners must deal with the inharmonicity of piano strings, which is
>present in different amounts in all of the ranges of the instrument, but
>especially in the bass and high treble registers. The result is that
>octaves
>are tuned slightly wider than the harmonic 2:1 ratio. The exact amount
>octaves are stretched in a piano tuning varies from piano to piano and
>even
>from register to register within a single piano-depending on the exact
>inharmonicity of the strings involved.
>
>Because of the problem of inharmonicity, electronic piano tuning devices
>used by some piano technicians are not designed to tune according to a
>simple harmonic series. Rather, the devices use various means to duplicate
>the stretched octaves and other adjustments a technician makes by ear. The
>most sophisticated devices allow a technician to make custom inharmonicity
>measurements--simultaneously considering all partials for pitch and volume
>to determine the most appropriate stretch to employ for a given
>instrument.
>Some include an option to simply record a tuning that a technician has
>completed by ear; the technician can then duplicate that tuning on the
>same
>piano (or others of similar make and model) more easily and quickly.
>
>The issues surrounding setting the stretch by ear vs machine have not been
>settled, machines are better at deriving the absolute placement of
>semitones
>within a given chromatic scale, whereas non-machine tuners prefer to
>adjust
>these locations preferentially due to their temptation to make intervals
>more sonorous. The result is that pianos tuned by ear and immediately
>checked with a machine tend to vary from one degree to another from the
>purely theoretical semitone (mathematically the 12th root of two) due to
>human error and perception. (If pleasing the ear is the goal of an aural
>tuning, then pleasing the math is the goal of a machine tuning.) This is
>thought to be due to the fact that strings can vary somewhat from note to
>note and even from neighbors within a unison. This non-linearity is
>different from true falseness where a string creates false harmonics and
>is
>more akin to minor variations in string thickness, string sounding length
>or
>minor bridge inconsistencies.
>
>Piano tuning is a compromise-both in terms of choosing a temperament to
>minimize out-of-tuneness in the intervals and chords that will be played,
>and in terms of dealing with inharmonicity. For more information, see
>Piano
>acoustics and Piano tuning.
>
>Another factor that can cause problems is the presence of rust on the
>strings or dirt in the windings.[5] These factors can slightly raise the
>frequency of the higher modes, resulting in more inharmonicity.
>
>While others may offer somewhat differing interpretations of what is said
>here, it is at least simple and straightforward to get you into the
>ballpark
>of what is going on.
>
>Will Truitt
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On
>Behalf
>Of Paul Williams
>Sent: Sunday, November 11, 2012 4:47 PM
>To: pianotech at ptg.org
>Subject: Re: [pianotech] Possible adaptation for the Tuning Exam
>
>True; true A 440 is the way to go  If you can't set A-440 first, then you
>can't take the test period!
>Paul
>
>On 11/11/12 3:07 PM, "Jon Page" <jonpage at comcast.net> wrote:
>
>>If you can't hear beats, you can't use a tuning fork. You have to hear
>>the beats to 'zero' it in.
>>
>>Or is it that you can hears the beats on unisons and octaves but the
>>intervals elude you. Take the time, listen closer. Have a tuner guide
>>you as to what to listen to.
>>
>>A pitch pipe's pitch will vary by the degree of air flow. A harder blow
>>will create a higher pitch. Temperature would be another variable.
>>
>>I saw one tuner strike the fork on his knee and then hold the end
>>between his teeth, this allowed him to play the note and tune
>>simultaneously. It worked for him but it looked really weird.
>>
>>To set your A or C from a fork, tune the corresponding note to the fork
>>and then tune the note an octave lower to that note. Check the lower
>>note with the fork, listen to the beat rate and adjust lower note to
>>the octave to be the same beat rate sharp or flat. Check lower note
>>against fork. If off, tune the upper note to the new beat rate. Check
>>upper note against fork. If necessary, adjust the lower note to the
>>beat rate. Once you have established the lower note pure with the fork,
>>tune the upper note to it. Proceed with your temperament.
>>
>>But if you can't discern beats, stick with an ETD.
>>
>>--
>>Regards,
>>
>>Jon Page
>>
>>
>
>
>
>
>