List, especially Conrad, My last tuning of the day turned out to be an old Knabe Grand that came from Salt Lake City. It was a job I did for Tim Farley's business. He always wants HT type tuning, preferably 1/7 Comma Meantone but he trusts my judgment and accepts EBVT. I decided to listen to the temperament and to my pleasant surprise, it was a passable ET! There was a note on the piano asking for it to be tuned at A-440 but no specified temperament. The children were home and let me in and the man of the house was to be home shortly. There was Bach's book of Goldberg Variations (all the music has only one sharp and in my opinion, this does in no way require ET) on the music desk and under that, there was an old tuning hammer and an A fork. I tested the A and it was on pitch. I listened to the temperament and contrary to my usual finding, it was a nearly flawless ET with no Reverse Well tendencies. I recorded it in my Exam program and having studied how to do that D*** FAC Program, I put it in and tuned the F3-F4 octave. I then read the results into the Reference page of the Exam program. There were but three small errors that gave the temperament as it was a score of 91. This was the first time in a real long time that I wasn't sure what to do. I called Mr. Farley and told him the circumstances adding that I really didn't know why the piano was being tuned since it was pretty darn good the way it was. I asked if he thought I should go ahead with ET this time and he said, "yes". I hated spoiling an 11 year record of having NEVER tuned ET for anyone for any reason (except PTG Exams). I dreaded listening to it afterwards but I thought perhaps *this* particular customer might be shocked at a different temperament because maybe he knows how to tune the piano himself and didn't know anything about HT's. I had started tuning when he came home. I talked to him for a while about the reasons Farley's technicians don't usually do ET. He was interested and had me start over doing the EBVT. He gave me a $10 tip and as I left, I heard the strains of the 1st Prelude of Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier Music coming from the house. Whew! I nearly spoiled a perfect record of 11 years of *unethical* tunings! Believe it, or STUFF it! Bill Bremmer RPT Madison, Wisconsin
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