Aural

[Don]

Hi Susan et al,

It seems to me that all we are saying is that beauty is subjective. To my
mind there are two paths that we try to follow, which are sometimes but not
often parrallel. If a piano is very stable then there is more chance of
being able to do *concert* type tuning. If it is *not* and the client
refuses our recommendations to make it so, then it may be in the best
interests of the client to deliberately leave some areas of the piano on
the edge of sounding less pleasant.

In particular in my area the tenor will drop very dramatically from summer
to winter. If I am tuning in the summer I will deliberately sacrifice the
beauty of that area pitch wise and leave it as sharp as I dare. I will also
"float" the pitch. Every effort is made to include the client in this
decision making process, partly in hops that they will start to understand
that I can't do my best work for them.

The other path is doing a tuning as perfectly as I can. I use the Baldassin
Sanderson temperament, and a single mute. Every unison must be clean enough
to tune from. Of course, I can only do this when there is from a *musical*
point of view almost zero pitch change at A4. (zero would be better).

The real adavantage imho of *any* measuring device is to let the technician
know quickly and accurately "which* path to choose. 

Let me close with two questions. Does a camera "enjoy" the process of
creating a copy of a summer day's sunset? Would a blind man appreciate the
visual beauty Mona Lisa? 


Regards,
Don Rose, B.Mus., A.M.U.S., A.MUS., R.M.T., R.P.T.

Tuner for the Saskatchewan Centre of the Arts

drose@dlcwest.com
http://donrose.htmlplanet.com/

3004 Grant Rd.
REGINA, SK
S4S 5G7
306-352-3620 or 1-888-29t-uner