[CAUT] using as ETD

[David Love]

Too many Davids here I'm not sure what response goes to what anymore.  

David Love
www.davidlovepianos.com


-----Original Message-----
From: David Love [mailto:davidlovepianos at comcast.net] 
Sent: Saturday, April 17, 2010 4:51 PM
To: 'caut at ptg.org'
Subject: RE: [CAUT] using as ETD

Sorry but the quote you cited was mine.  So I assumed you were responding to
what I wrote.  

David Love
www.davidlovepianos.com


-----Original Message-----
From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of Susan
Kline
Sent: Saturday, April 17, 2010 12:51 PM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: Re: [CAUT] using as ETD

David, you might keep in mind the post I was replying to. Jeff had 
said that when he started using the ETD he felt it put him much more 
closely in touch with a piano. He said the diagnostic abilities of an 
ETD revealed far more about a piano than we can do unaided.

So, I was wondering what great revelations an ETD could produce which 
our ears could not. (I really was ... is there some capacity of an 
ETD I'm unaware of?) My idea of an ETD is that it says, "this note is 
high -- well, now you have it too low -- ah, that's just right. And 
by the way, that unison you tuned five minutes ago -- one of the 
strings is exactly 1.3 cents flat now." Not that this isn't all good 
information, I just didn't see how it adds up to a great new 
understanding of and contact with a piano, compared to tuning it 
aurally. In aural tuning one gets the full tonal envelope and has the 
capacity to listen to different intervals and therefore the voicing 
and tonal blend as the overtones from two or more real physical 
strings mix with each other.

Perhaps there's now an ETD which can listen not only to all the 
partials and their different strengths, but also how they interact 
with all the partials of other notes? The physical, not the 
theoretical partials? But then, even after it "listened" to all that, 
would it have the taste to decide which exact placement of a note 
sounded more musical? And all very, very close to ET? That would take 
one powerful algorithm!

Moving up the scale after setting an equal temperament (not that hard 
to set one which is close enough to exact that no musical difference 
will be discernible when playing), ... that is, having set a decent 
temperament and then moving up the scale, I try fourths and fifths 
and octaves with each note, all the way to the top. This prevents 
"outliers" from straying and puts everything into a sort of 
self-reinforcing interval net, where anything which wanders too far 
from the ideal will stick out and be noticed, and where any chance 
discrepancies from ET will tend to wander back into The Plan instead 
of diverging. It also catches any notes which have shifted since they 
were tuned. And one ends up able to play open chords of extreme 
clarity and warmth, especially those covering a wide span. There is 
some music which really grooves on that.

Not that a tuner with an excellent ear and a good ETD used right 
couldn't achieve that -- but is it as satisfying as "cooking from scratch"?

Susan (who isn't the problem!) <grin> (I'll have to remember that one 
... thanks, David.)


>But nothing...are you saying the minutiae of pitch isn't important 
>in aural tuning?   That's what I always suspected.   This whole 
>sound you love is happening one note at time.   You bring the octave 
>into relative tune and check it with other intervals and make 
>adjustments.  I do the same thing except the next note set with 
>ETD.  Your ballparking is no more whole sound than mine.  I love 
>aural tuning instruction where you are told to not worry about a 
>note because you will come back and adjust it later on...I prefer to 
>have all notes very close.