Aural?

[Billbrpt@AOL.COM]

In a message dated 9/29/00 8:27:18 PM Central Daylight Time, 
mfarrel2@tampabay.rr.com (Farrell) writes:

<< I am interested in understanding your use of the Sanderson AccuTuner. Your
 approach appears unique.
 
 > I have no need at all for the FAC type calculation.  I, in fact don't even
 > know how to do it and don't even want to learn.  To me, it is useless.
 *I*
 > and *I* alone determine the intervals and the stretch.
 >  I still do the wound
 > strings on most pianos entirely by ear and when I reach the 7th octave on
 > many pianos, I stop looking at the SAT.
 
 You apparently use a SAT.  But you do not use FAC numbers. That's amazing. I
 do not understand how to operate the SAT without inputting FAC numbers to
 calculate a tuning (and then modifying the calculated tuning to your
 taste/preference by manipulation of the FAC number or the Double Octave Beat
 feature on the SAT III). Could you please explain your procedure. I am
 always interested how to better use this valuable tool. Thanks
  >>

It's not so amazing at all.  There are two other modes in which you can use 
the SAT.  They are found right in the manual:  The Program Mode and the 
Direct Interval Mode.  As you know, I do not tune Equal Temperament (ET) but 
it can also be done this way.  Rick Baldassin RPT and Jim Coleman RPT have 
done a lot of work in this area.  Some of their work is included in the 
manual and Rick's publication is available from the PTG Home Office. The 
title is, "On Pitch".  

If you have done an aural tuning with which you are really pleased, you can 
record it into the SAT and use it over and over.  This is particularly useful 
when tuning institutional pianos.  Once you are satisfied with a tuning, why 
not keep it and reproduce it easily, over and over?  You can create a 
programmed tuning by starting with your A4 at 0.0, then, as you perfect each 
part of it, the temperament octave, the midrange, etc., record those values 
as you go.  Even if your tuning shifts in pitch on you as you go, you can 
correct it until it holds on to what you have determined to be correct.

I once tuned the Thomas Young #1 temperament for Owen Jorgensen RPT, for a 
recital at the Annual Convention.  I am not really familiar with this 
temperament, so he told me at each step how to tune the next note.  Once each 
note was tuned, it was entered into memory.  Once he was satisfied that the 
temperament was correct, I could tune the octaves the way he specified, with 
"optimum stretch".  If any part of the tuning drifted during the work, I 
could correct it until it held upt to firm test blows.  

This can be a way of studying and tuning HT's that does not use the FAC 
program.  Follow the directions and once you are satisfied that the 
temperament sounds the way it is supposed to, record it and you have it for 
all time, for that kind of piano.

The other way, by Direct Interval, you tune intervals and octave exactly as 
you have decided to do.  If you want to tune a pure 5th, for example, you 
choose the set of coincident partials you want to match.  When both notes 
stop the lights, you have your interval and you can enter the note to be 
tuned into memory.  You can also make a compromise between two sets of 
coincident partials.  The lights will move as sharp for one set and flat for 
the other.  When you get them to move equally in opposite directions, you 
have a perfect (dare I say, Meantone) or Equal Beating compromise between the 
two.

This is the way I tune my octaves from F5 to C8.  I compare the double octave 
and the octave and 5th.  When the lights move slightly but equally and in 
opposite directions for both comparisons, the desired compromise has been 
made.  The very same compromise can be made aurally.  When that exact 
compromise has been made, you can enter it into the programmed tuning mode.

The Direct Interval mode can be used for ET or any temperament.  If you want 
a 3rd to be 14 cents wide as in ET, you can make it that way, exactly.  If 
you want it pure or 1, 2 or 3 cents or any amount wide for an HT you can do 
that too.  You can make a 1/7 Comma Meantone Temperament (in which the 5ths 
are theoretically 3.07 cents narrow) but adjust those 5ths for inharmonicity 
to 2.9, 2.8 or 2.7 cents the way I have learned to do.

I feel much more in command and control if I have constructed the temperament 
interval by interval and have determined exactly what my octave stretch is to 
be and programmed the SAT to produce it rather than hoping that the 
calculation is correct.

Bill Bremmer RPT
Madison, Wisconsin