ears vs. eyes..kinda long-winded

[Don]

Hi Ric,

When I tune for a concert I ask that the piano be *conditioned* or
*seasoned* to concert like conditions for three hours before I tune it, and
kept that way until the artist performs. That way there is (usually) no
"drift". If there is an intermission and the piano has been "banged on
hard" I might check unisons and perhaps octaves if there is time. These are
done with my "wetware" computer.

Pianos do not float well in my experience. Unisons will "squirm" and the
bass tenor break will be poor. Control the enviroment as much as possible
if you do concert work. Finish the finally tuning as close to the public
entering the doors as is prudent.

There are persons who can hear these (from a musicians point of view) small
changes. There are also those audience members who can do so as well. And
of course I can hear them so I tune to please myself to work towards
perfection.

At 01:36 AM 10/25/02 -0500, you wrote:
>But Don,
>    If at *concert time* the concert level tuning is half a beat
>off, you are going to change every pin and string to do two cent
>pitch raise and expect it to be as solid as it was before?
>    If the piano is one beat off at intermission what are you
>going to do about that?
>    The point is machine can show the piano "floating" as much as
>one cycle per second at A440 from when it is tuned to the end of
>the performance. This is more than a tuning fork can do.
>      You are a musician, who is going to gripe if the piano if
>half a beat off at concert time?  How do they play if the piano
>does indeed "float" a half or one cycle per second during the
>performance?    ---ric


Regards,
Don Rose, B.Mus., A.M.U.S., A.MUS., R.M.T., R.P.T. Tuner for the Center of
the Arts

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