An Afternoon with Jim Coleman, Tuning, Day one, Part I

[Richard Moody]

If you get Jim Coleman on the phone and he is home, you are certain to be
invited over. If you have read Alfred Doldge describing how  aspiring
piano tuners and piano makers visited the great masters, you begin to
get a sense of historical dejavous as you close in on Jim's house in the
great metropolis of Phoenix, Tempe actually.  A warm welcome and a
Steinway L---for tuning and playing. An Endless Afternoon...twice....the
actual experience and the memory. It is amazing how long an occasion of
the expansion of breadth of knowledge takes to reminisce.
 
	The first time (Sept 97) I met Jim my only credentials were that I was
"someone on the internet"  Dubious to say the least.  I wasn't even in the
Guild directory. No matter, I felt welcomed as if I had four letters of
recomendation.  I was flattered that my introduction to his L was
foremost. Hmm it looked like a serious ongoing tuning, as nearly every set
of strings was muted. Jim had been tuning his "Coleman Perfect Fifth
Expanded Octave Temperament" or at least that is my name for it. So
immediately the internet connections began to click. Jim had posted
extensively on this during the summer of 97 on Pianotech list, and I had
tried it. 
	"You probably won't like these wide octaves," he began, "As from your
posts you favor pure octaves. But listen to the double, triple and
quadruple octaves". He played them with an air acheivement. And they
sounded even more impressive, beatless as in overcomming an impossiblilty.
	"Wow....!!" I said. It wasnt' until a year and half later I realized how
significant this was as his L presents a number of inharmonicity
challenges. (Which btw are neatly resolved by the SAT, and more adruously
by the EAR. ; ) (Both of which Jim is the consumate master of but I am
getting ahead.)
	So as masters tend to do, the conversation got focused..... on octaves,
pure and expanded. True I "didn't like" the C4--C5 octave when sounded as
a test, as it did audibly beat, but as Jim demonstrated, in playing, the
beats were not nearly noticible as one would expect. So much so I began to
wonder if this was to be the tuning of the future. But how the heck could
it be tuned aurally? 
	To begin, Jim had me tune an ET temp between A3 and A4, and then went to
answer email. OK, I became gripped in the man versus machine senerio.  I
figured I better get this done fast, so when he came back 15 minutes
later, I had F3--C5 done. He checked it aurally, I was standing back, lo
and behold it still sounded OK. Then he compared it to the machine. I
ended up walking on three inches of air as the lights weren't moving.  It
was the first time I had to compare to the SAT. 
	Then he knocked some strings down and asked me to tune again this time to
the machine...the opportunity presenting itself, at last to try the SAT. 
It  went smoothly, a myriad of questions answered during the tuning of the
first notes. I was always curious how the pins and strings would be set
with machine tuning. Completely diff from my techinique, but actually
easier it seemed. The machine registers so little difference, by the time
you coax the string to agree with the machine it is set. I am not a
pounder but three or four strings got two or three FFFF s and still read
steady on the SAT. This is too easy, I began to think, then I noticed two
lights were appearing top and bottom instead of one---intersting, as I
began to get more and more notes with two lights.  This time Jim came back
in 7 minutes and watched me tune the last three notes.  Then he sat down
did aural checks which sounded good and started at the A3 and proceeded to
get FIVE lights, (he made the middle light stay on longer) and go through
the temp.  
	It was a good demonstration of the SAT. It might have been an advanced
copy of the SAT III.  But what intrigued me more was the Coleman Beat
Locator, two strips of thin cardboard to be placed on the keyboard or on
top of each other to show the coincedent partials of any interval chosen.
This ingenious device is worthy of a post of its own, along with mention
of the educational materials Jim and colleagues have put together over the
years.  

Richard Moody 
..