[pianotech] Absolute pitch customer

[johnparham at piano88.com]

Lim,

There may not be a good answer to your question, but consider the
following questions that we, on this list, may be turning over in our
minds:
1. What note is the customer playing?
2. How accurate is the customer's electronic device?
3. Did you tune the piano to A440 with your ETD then check A440 after
you got finished to see at what pitch that note really ended up?
4. Did you use aural tests to "prove" that note in question?
5. Did you play that note with other intervals to get your customer's
reaction?
6. Is the piano a well-scaled piano with low inharmonicity, or is does
it have suspected scaling issues that would require substantial tuning
compromises?
7. Did you tune it to the customer's liking then play intervals as close
to A440 as possible to see if what he is hearing as correct is even a
possibility?
8. Does the customer wear a hearing aide that could interfere with pitch
(I had a customer complain the same way, and she wore a hearing aide.)
9. Are there voicing issues that may be producing partials that are
affecting the customer's pitch perception?
10. Does customer understand that all 87 notes are tuned "off pitch"
because of inharmonicity?

Again, there may not be a good way to satisfy someone who claims to have
"perfect pitch."  I will be curious as to how other technicians deal
with these situations.  

Good luck!

Best,
John Parham

> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: [pianotech] Absolute pitch customer
> From: limhseng at gmail.com
> Date: Sun, October 03, 2010 12:59 pm
> To: pianotech at ptg.org
> 
> 
> Hello,
> 
> How do you explain to a customer who says 'I have absolute pitch and the moment I touch the keyboard I know its wrong and my electronic tuner says so'?
> 
> After tuning this piano for close to 2 hrs this comment spoils my day.
> 
> 
> 
> Lim
> 
> 
> 
> Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld 
> 
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