<HTML>In a message dated 9/22/02 2:38:23 PM Central Daylight Time, Richard.Brekne@grieg.uib.no writes: <BLOCKQUOTE TYPE=CITE style="BORDER-LEFT: #0000ff 2px solid; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px">I think you have to remember that Franz was primarily a Steinway tuner. You know... Steinways... those pianos that have such lousy scales that even the PTG wont use one for an exam ??? "Lousy scale" essentially  being defined in this context as being "a scale that an ETD cannot reliably and accurately project onto a SAT or RCT type tuning curve". And therein perhaps lies his experience and stubbornness on the issue. He perhaps has actually heard time and time again less then judicious ETD users attempt to force such a curve on such and instrument without due prejudice by the ear to correct for the disparages inherent. </BLOCKQUOTE> Exactly.  In his experience, he never met a tuner who used an ETD who could either do a good tuning or one that would hold.  I knew and studied Franz Mohr's techniques and tuned a Steinway L for him at the Convention in Portland the year before I made the commitment to no longer tune in ET. While he liked what I did with ET very much, he could not accept tuning the piano any other way and had his reasons.  From what I know now and what I heard, Franz didn't always tune exactly the same way nor did he always tune a strict ET.  But he would never talk about the differences he made in clinical terms, only artistic ones.  "You stretch the octaves until they shine", he would say with a big grin. He certainly would not ever allow his tunings to be electronically analyzed or scrutinized.  He refused to take the PTG Tuning Exam and accepted the fact that he would have to remain an Associate in spite of his obviously superior skills.  He could never tell you an exact formula for hammer hardening "juice".  He never knew what grade of sandpaper he used, it was just coarse, medium or fine.  He never measured anything, all was done by feel and instinct. I think this indicates that there is an area of "wiggle room" which needs to be explored, studied, documented and understood.  While there is a need for consistency which ETD's provide, there is also that area where the individual aural tuning goes which ETD programs can't exactly follow or duplicate, at least the way they are set up now. I have often heard and seen people comment that their ETD created such a good tuning that they could not improve upon it.  Yet, the PTG Exam Committee does just that:  it takes an ETD generated tuning and refines it.  It often takes them hours to change it just a little bit, an example of diminishing returns for the amount of time spent.  But when the skilled ETD user tunes the exam with the ETD, it always scores highly or even flawlessly.  That's because the tolerance between what was deemed perfect and what is acceptable is large enough. It is possible to tune an 18th Century style Well Tempered Tuning and still come to within the limits of tolerance for the PTG Exam.  I wouldn't call such a temperament "equal" and anyone who really knows and wants strict ET wouldn't accept it either but it still would pass if done just right. I only point this out to demonstrate that the more in depth the subject of tuning is pondered, the more questions will be raised.  Since the beginnings of tuning history in Pythagorus' time, the issues over what was right and wrong and what kinds of effects they had not only on music but on people's emotions have been documented.  Some statements are really hot headed and abusive.  All kinds of false notions are attributed to the way one tunes or tempers, all throughout music and tuning history. The desire today to want to believe that the question has been answered, the problem solved and you don't really have to understand it, just turn on the box and dial in a few numbers and out it comes is the most restrictive of all, in my opinion.  That's why I don't use someone else's calculated program or device, no matter how good they may be.  I simply don't need it.   The SAT II provides all that I need in an ETD: the ability to measure intervals and to store a custom tuning arrangement which no automatic program that exists today can quite duplicate.  To me, the most important qualities of the ETD are its ability to produce whatever it is programmed to do over and over, consistently and its ability to reduce the overall stress in tuning.  But the higher forms of art in tuning can only come from years of study, trial and error and the ability to make the ETD do what you want it to do rather than it telling you what is right. Bill Bremmer RPT Madison, Wisconsin <A HREF="http://www.billbremmer.com/">Click here: -=w w w . b i l l b r e m m e r . c o m =-</A> </HTML>