FWD: Sharp organ

[Ron Nossaman]

>I just had an experience with a pipe
>organ which was recently tuned.  The pitch was just
>above A-443. I double checked this with a spare fork
>and with the digital piano in the church.   All
>confirmed my initial finding.  Really sharp.  Of
>course, the choir director loves to play duets.  The
>piano they use is a 25? year old Kawai 300 grand.   My
>question is this: In a situation like this  do we just
>go ahead and tune the piano that sharp informing the
>church they will have to tune it again and pay for any
>string breakage?  How sharp is too sharp?  The organ
>is almost new and pitch was not a problem prior to
>this.  How much slack do we cut pipe organ tuners?
>Thanks,
>						Greg Hollister RPT				

Hi Greg,
The situation here is that pipe organs are tremendously unstable
instruments, with metal and wooden pipes responding at different rates, and
in different directions to temperature and humidity swings. Organ tuners
know that an organ that is nominally fifteen cents sharp today, could just
as easily be fifteen cents flat next week, then sharp again the week after.
That being the case, they tend to make minimal base pitch changes when
tuning, and clean it up overall at a pitch that will hopefully average out
around A-440 during these climate swings. Since the piano is so very much
more stable than the organ, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me to
compromise the piano to the organ. It's a moving target. Best to center the
piano at 440, and let the organ pitch fluctuate around it day by day. That
way, if the organ tuner guessed right, the two instruments will be more
nearly, and more often in tune than with any other method. It's kind of
like a broken clock being right twice a day, only in this case the piano is
the one that's right.

Be warned, however, that this is a VERY tough concept to get across to the
administration. They know organs cost much more to tune than do pianos, so
the organ must be the one that's "correct" - whatever the pitch is this week.


Ron N