Aural?

[Brian Trout]

I tune either way, depending upon my mood, and the situation.  Started out
with the Peterson Strobotuner (? the twelve wheel wonder?), quickly grew to
hate that, and moved on to the world of aural tuning.  Picked up many tips
and techniques over the years, but ended up pretty much developing my own
tuning progression, my own hybrid variety if you will.

It's not until within the last 18 months or so that I was even willing to
have a look at these "tuning machines".  Discovered TuneLab, and find it to
be pretty good.  I still argue with it, though, most specifically at the
tenor break.  Dave Porritt has a great little program that provides a
"Calculate" function for the TuneLab program, and it does a pretty good job.
But I still find I usually will need do at least some tweaking, most
significantly where there are wound strings on the lower end of the long
bridge.

Mitch mentioned that he doesn't count beats.  I don't either.  I started out
that way, but having a couple of tunings under my belt,  I can play most any
temperament interval I'm tuning and pretty much know what might be normal
beating coming from the interval.  I'm more worried about how the intervals
progress from one to another.  The smoother the better, to my ear.

A friend of mine, another tech, came up to me while I was tuning one day,
and stopped and looked.  He said what he saw would make a great picture.
The old and the new.  The laptop sitting on the plate of a grand, and a
tuning hammer that is probably older than I am.    "The Old World Meets
Technology".

I look at the ETD as just another tool I can use in my arsenal to take on
the challenges I face.  I could easily live without it.  But I choose to use
it for what it is, another tool, and I believe a good one...  they're great
tools, but horrible masters.

FWIW,

Brian Trout
Quarryville, PA
btrout@desupernet.net