Tales of William Braid White (was re: introduction)

[David Ireland]

Fred

It was good to hear from you.  I was at OSU working on a Master's degree in 1971.
That was a wild year. I was tear gassed and threatened with guns. I guess going
to class was a crime back then :-).

I do have a few tales of William Braid White. My dad described him as a very
proper Victorian gentleman. He used the English Language with precision and
expected others to do the same.  Apparently he spoke in that same stilted
syle with which he wrote.  Dr. White attended some function where a student
had brought a date.  The young lady described the student as her "guy".  Dr.
White cringed and explained that a guy was a cable which gave support to a
telephone pole.

Although Dr. White was not mean or nasty, he was severe--exacting and demanding.
When my dad was in his seventies, he told me that in difficult tuning situations,
he could always feel the presence of Dr. White looking over his shoulder to
see if was taking some expedient or shortcut. To this day, I have my dad and Dr.
White looking over mine! Some day I will start a thread on "How do you deal
with the terrible piano?"

Students at Dr. White's school learned to tune unisons first.  There were a
number of upright backs--no keyboards or actions--at the back of the room. Students
learned to tune unisons by picking the strings. This is actually a pretty good
method.  The beats are clearer and you get some appreciation of the fact
that plucking the string at different places produces different sounds.

Before students could tune octaves, they had to learn all of the accoustical
theory about simaltaneous propagation of waves and interference
patterns. At this point they could use instruments with keyboards and
actions.  Dr. White gave classroom demonstrations.  He had a Conn Chromatic
Stroboscope with the 13 (as I reacall) spinning disks. When he taught
temperment, which he called "Laying the bearings", he would set up the
strobe where the class could see it. He would then turn his back on it
and set a temperment.  Dad said that not only did he stop the appropriate
wheel dead every time, but he often did it with a single flip of the wirst.
Dad said he could drop-in unisons like a machine. This was disquieting to
students who would saw away on the strings for an hour to tune an octave,
but it gave them hope that the seemingly impossible task was do-able with
enough practice.

This school used what we would today call the mastery approach. Students did
not have to be fast, not at first, but they needed to be accurate. No
one was permitted to sit while tuning an upright piano--"Lazy and sloppy".
Dr. White recommended standing while tuning grands, though he didn't
insist on it. I have found that when I am having difficulty hearing
something while tuning a grand, standing helps.  It also helps me with
the low bass.

Dad told me about playing chamber music at Dr. White's home.  Musicians
from the University of Chicago would join him.  He didn't play with
these groups other than control his reproducing piano. The instrument
was of his own design.  It had mechanisms all of the way down to the
floor. There were musical selections where it would be impossible to
find a pianist who could join them.  Dad said that some of the music
had torturous piano parts (my dad was a fine pianist and able to
judge this, but he played violin in these groups. He was Concertmaster
of the Mansfield Symphony for decades). Dr. White's piano allowed
the string players to play music that they otherwise would not have
the opportunity to play for lack of a pianist. It allowed Dr. White
to test his mechanisms under playing conditions. Dad described some
kind of a board with a grid on it that Dr. White used to punch his
piano rolls, one hole at a time, from the musical score.

Dr. White knew the field of accoustics as it existed then.  He taught
from Helmholtz's "Sensations of Tone". I still have dad's copy.

Dr. White had a method of tuning two pianos for a concert.

Step 1-Tune one piano correctly.
Step 2-Match Middle C on the second piano to the first piano.
Step 3-Tune the second piano correctly.
Step 4-Identify and resolve any obvious problems.

Oddly enough, this method has always worked well for me. My dad had a
variation on it.  There was an annual recital held at a local school
auditorium.  The school has a quite decent Baldwin grand and so
did the teacher.  Dad would tune the school piano and then tune the
teacher's piano in her home.  After the piano was moved from the
home to the school, he would do Step 4-Identify and resolve any
obvious problems.  It rarely took more than 20 minutes.

I owe Dr. White a tremendous debt.  He was a powerful influence on my
father who was a powerful influence on me.  Once every few years I
re-read "Piano Tuning and Allied Arts".  I just re-read it this year.
Although I enjoy the very fine books that have been published in
recent years, I keep returning to that book. When we technicians
disagree about something or take opposite approaches, the acid test
I use to guide me is "Which opinion is consistent with my experience"
and "What did Dr. White say about it?"  My other hero is Dr. W. Edwards
Deming who said that many of our problems stem not from what we don't
know, but from what we know that is not so! From time-to-time a consensus
forms about some problem, based on something we know that is not
so. Dr. White's work can take us back to a time before we knew some of the
things that are not so.


> Do you have more  interesting stories about your dad or Mr. White?  The
> PTG might even be interested in publishing them. I think others would
> also find them interesting and worthwhile.  It is definitely an important
> part of piano history!
>
> Fred Scoles, RPT