Duplex scale

[Delwin D Fandrich]

Michael Jorgensen wrote:

> Hello ddf,
>      Thank-you for taking time from your busy schedule of creativity to
> respond to my post. I know bridges don't really float but they do move,
> unlike (hopefully) pressure bars.  Perhaps that floating bridge E of
> downtown Seattle would be a closer analogy?
>     Is energy transfer the only important function of strings?  Could
> pivitol action at bearing pts. alter imharmonicity and create a sweeter
> tone?

It probably does alter the inharmonicity of the string. But inharmonicity doesn't have much to do with tone quality.

> I know of alot of loud but ugly sounding pianos out there.  I
> find the new Yamaha C grands have tuned rear segments, some an octave
> and some a 19th.

There are ugly sounding pianos built both with and without tuned front duplex scales. But it's harder to build an ugly
sounding piano without the tuned front duplex scale than it is with one. It's also hard to build an ugly sounding nine-foot
piano. It's been done, but they really had to work at it.

Whether the back scale -- the rear duplex segment -- is tuned or not doesn't have all that much to do with tone quality as
long as the back scale is long enough so that it doesn't restrict the motion of the bridge and soundboard.


>    Steinways' duplex scale has been such an icon and for so long, it is
> hard to accept that it doesn't have some good purpose.

Yep. And buggy whips and tubeless tires were hard to give up as well.

> I know sailors
> built many exquisite designs and sailed the high seas thousands of years
> before they finally learned how sails really work - by "lift" not
> catching the wind.  Could the duplex scale be one such thing-works but
> we don't know why?  I think sympathetic noise from these segments is
> about worthless and probably a liability-ie. the kind of thing we work
> to voice out. You truly love pianos, a rare man in the industry- I wish
> there were more like that---Mike Jorgensen

I have yet to see one that truly works. Well, that's not true, I've come across all too many that work all too well. But I
don't like what they do when they do work -- especially when they work "properly." Kind of like cigarettes. Used properly,
they kill you. Well, tuned front duplex scales won't kill you, but they are pretty hard on good piano tone.

One question: If we all truly thought of these systems as "good things," why are we constantly doing such horrible things to
the hammers in these vain attempts to "voice out" the effect they have on piano tone? What did the poor hammers ever do to
deserve that kind of treatment?

-- ddf