[CAUT] Test Standards (was Steinway stretch)

[Jeff Tanner]

On Tuesday, November 30, 2004, at 10:09 AM, Fred Sturm wrote:

> Hi Dave,
>     I certainly agree that one has to set a standard, and it has to be 
> firm.
> And I would even agree that, generally speaking, the PTG test 
> standards for
> ET and octaves are good ones. However, where I see a problem is in the
> emphasis. In the 25 years since the test appeared, what has been made
> tighter? ET standards in temperament and midrange (multipliers 
> increased).
> What has become looser? Stability standards (when stability is 
> checked, you
> are no longer responsible for precisely where those notes are).

Hey Fred,
Perhaps there is a good reason for this.  When I took the test at one 
of the regional conferences, the room we wound up finding the piano in 
was, shall we say, less than ideal.  The test committee was not happy 
with it, but there was not a whole lot they could do about it, and they 
had a bunch of tests lined up, so we basically had to deal with what we 
were dealt.  It was your typical hotel room, complete with "under the 
window" air conditioning -- yes, right next to where they had to place 
the piano.  With the air off, the room temp quickly rose well above 80 
degrees.  The piano was basically wrapped in plastic to shield it from 
air flow.  With the a/c on, and the piano wrapped in plastic, hearing 
partials was next to impossible.  So, you turn the air off for a while 
to tune a bit, then turn it back on to try to cool the room down.  That 
piano moved all over the place.  My stability was good, though I don't 
know how far away from the original mid section measurements it was.  
But by the time he got around to measuring my unisons (that's the last 
thing, right?), he told me my original pitches had moved quite a bit.

It had been, after all, what, about 3 1/2 hours ago?  And stability is 
checked something like 2 or 2 1/2 hours after those strings were 
initially set?



>     And, of course, the emphasis in a majority of articles about 
> tuning is
> toward finer and finer nit-picking of ET progression, and looking at 
> single
> octaves in isolation (whatever width they may be - rather than looking 
> at
> the piano as a whole and its entire stretch over three and four octave
> spans), giving the impression that by paying closer and closer 
> attention to
> these details you will create better tunings.
>     In fact, I'd argue that the opposite is true. Focusing too much
> attention and time on that nit-picking stuff leaves less time and 
> attention
> available for what really matters: unisons and stability. So I'd 
> suggest
> there is a second alternative to the current test, in addition to 
> "good old
> boy." Relax ET standards a bit (not more than where they were in the 
> 1980's)
> and create a much more rigorous unison and stability standard. My 
> druthers
> would be three octaves of unisons, stability tested _before_ being 
> read.
> Regards,
> Fred Sturm
> University of New Mexico
>

Personally, I like the idea of your test here.  But then, I like the 
idea of a "Registered Piano Technician" being a fairly basically 
competent tuner/tech.  After all, the nomenclature in the title doesn't 
suggest any advanced level of craftsmanship, which I think the current 
test standards require.  I think we'd have more RPTs and more PTG 
involvement if we had a bit less involved test procedure which focused 
more on whether or not the tuner's "got the idea" AND CAN STABILIZE IT, 
and refine the current test idea for a "CRAFTSMAN" level tech.  But, 
that's me.