<HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>Re: one rubber mute</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY> <BLOCKQUOTE>>We are = still waiting for an explanation of "shimming" unisons. </BLOCKQUOTE> Shimming, or “cracking” unisons, is something Virgil Smith has = talked about for many years.  I’ve also had an in-depth conversat= ion about it with Eric Schandall, a true wizard from the Steinway basement--= -he uses it every time he tunes. Shimming is changing the pitch extremely slightly of the right string of a = unison, and then bringing the other two strings in unison with the right. Wi= th some practice, your temperament becomes super, super precise; more than y= ou thought possible. The possibility of executing super small pitch moves to= idealize your temperament has been a very powerful focusing device for me; = it’s allowed me to make what I call an ideal temperament for that pian= o in between 20 and 30 minutes---and the temperament is SOCKED in solid. <BR= > >From it, you can trust without reservation that you’re replicating th= e note relationships within the temperament over the entire compass of the p= iano---with the proper stretch, of course.  In my system, following tho= se slowly rolling fourths down to A0 is my automatic stretch calculator in t= he bass; after A5 or so, I switch from checking with fourths to checking wit= h double and triple octaves, and sometimes with 11ths and 18ths, which shoul= d act like fourths---slowly rolling. I WILL send a version of my tuning pattern and protocol; I wrote it back 3-= 4 months ago, and then Virgil had an article in the Journal, and I guess I f= elt intimidated---but what the heck; I’ll send it soon---after some mo= re little editing and tweaking. My best to all, David Andersen </BODY> </HTML>