>>One can be immediately aware of drifting that has taken place when one >>is using a visual tuning device. > >Do you mean to imply this is not easily accomplished while tuning aurally? >Ken Sloane, Oberlin Conservatory To me, this is a very interesting question. It may be that temperature-induced drift could BEST be handled by tuning aurally. It depends upon one's point of view and what one wishes the end result of the tuning to be. Assume one is tuning aurally and the drift happens after the last time the pitch of the piano is checked with the pitch source. Whole sections of the piano are likely to move together somewhat uniformly. If all the notes within a section change the same amount, then one could check through whole sections of the piano and not notice the drift, since everything is being checked with notes that have themselves moved. This is all I meant. However, the various sections of the piano are not likely to move uniformly in relation to each other. The bass and mid-range might be more affected than the high treble, for example. Tuning aurally, one might check through the bass and mid-range finding everything OK; then when one comes to the high treble, it could sound wrong and in need of re-tuning even though it is actually the LEAST affected. Tuning visually through the bass and mid-range, the drift would have been immediately apparent because each note would be checked against the original electonic setting as well as against notes that have drifted, and one could have decided immediately whether to go with the new drifted pitch level, or re-establish the original pitch level either by re-tuning or by trying to undo the temperature change. Kent Swafford "There are no rules here, and if you break them, you will be punished."
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