---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment List, I have been far too occupied during the last 2 weeks to read much of what has been discussed here. I've been doing as I have for over 13 years now, tuning not a single piano in ET. I have tuned for public performances, rehearsed the Bach St. Matthew Passion in which I will perform as one of the soloists today, attended a Baroque English Opera where the harpsichord was in Meantone and tuned a Steinway A & B for young artists who are preparing to be in competitions. Both are studying Beethoven. Both choose me as their technician because of the superior way I make their pianos sound and for how long they continue to sound good after being tuned. I did manage to read some of what Ted Sambell wrote. My encounter with him is very clear in my memory too. Let me say that I do respect him very much. I believe that he is the caliber of PTG Member who deserves the kind of recognition provided by the Hall of Fame or Golden Hammer award. Anyone would be lucky to have him as a mentor. I clearly remember Ted's very strong admonition. If it wasn't a finger pointing, I remember a hand gesture, what the French would call "montrant le doigt" (showing the finger) intended to dissuade me from the ideas I had about tuning. The piano I used that day in 1990 was a Korean import which was used to give PTG Tuning Exams. I was on the Exam Committee, training to become a Certified Tuning Examiner. In order to qualify for that training, I had to have passed the exam with all scores above 90 which I had done fully 8 years previously and scoring a perfect 100 on unisons among other scores. Now, Ted said my unisons and octaves were bad but he had noticed an improvement in more recent years. That piano had some very bad false beats which were noted as part of the record. I had also invited an RPT who is a piano dealer from New York to play the piano. Both Ted and he said the same thing and both banged violently on the notes they thought were mistuned and unstable. I explained that false beats were the cause but apparently Ted does not remember that. As for the octaves, I was also using the unique Tempered Octave system I had developed several years previous to that event and which I still use today, have been using all along and certainly will continue to use. Neither my unisons nor my octaves are substantially different or better now than they were 12 years ago, except that I may have more skill at hiding false beats through unison tuning today than I did then. I listened to what Ted had to say and noted it. I also noted that it was coming from a most erudite practitioner who commanded a great deal of respect. But I still was not at all convinced by what he had to say, just made aware that there are many people who must have the same strong convictions and sets of beliefs that he has. Ted's views are much like those which appear in Isacoff's new book, "Temperament". He does what William Braide White does, tips his hat, so to speak, to Meantone, letting us know that there once was this other way to tune but which is obsolete to the point of not even being worthy of study unless one wants to prove to oneself just why it is obsolete because of it's restrictiveness. There is no other possibility, so it would seem from reading these authors. Ted, Isacoff and others ascribe many accomplishments in music history to the use of ET. Others are grasping at any straw to try to show or prove that ET was in use at such and such dates in history so that such and such composer *may* have used a piano in ET. From this pure conjecture, we are supposed to be motivated to embrace the almighty oneness, correctness, appropriateness and infallibility of ET and reject any other idea as folly. Well, I don't. It was my work as an Examiner and learning to use such a tool as the SAT which demonstrated to me that ET never was and is not today the standard which it has always been believed to be. It is well achieved today by some top professionals but even in the latter part of the 20th Century, the tuning profession was not always consistent which can be heard on many recordings, even very recent ones. Ted implies that all evidence of acceptance of non ET is anecdotal but acceptance of ET is proof of its superiority. Ted's dislike of the Vallotti temperament that day in 1990 and his description of the distasteful sounds it produced were his opinion and thus anecdotal too. That piano dealer hated it too but what interested me was the fact that there were many people who tried it, listened to it and found it beautiful and intriguing. I remember one Quebecer telling me that the Beethoven which someone played on it sent chills up his spine the way no other tuning had ever done. Yet, we are supposed to dismiss this as anecdotal and go back to the idea which has been standard practice for over 100 years, so they say. It would be imposing to do anything else. It would be unethical to do anything else without explanation and permission and the offer to tune it *BACK* to ET if it is not found to be acceptable. I don't buy any of that because I know from many, many observations (some of them documented) that professional piano technicians, some of whom call themselves concert tuners cannot and do not tune in ET. In fact, I believe that it is the ET only philosophy which has led to the perversion of practice which I heard once called Reverse Well and which designation stuck with me. If there is only one way to tune, then that one way becomes whatever interpretation the practitioner puts upon it. It most often ends up being Reverse Well but is never recognized for what it is. It has been going on long enough and is pervasive enough however, that I believe it may have established its own influence on music, the way ET is thought to have done. I'm not going to tune any pianos in ET for anyone for any reason and that is my right and prerogative. If I lived in another area and worked under different circumstances, I might be forced to but that is why I choose to live and work where I do and as I do. If I did go tune in New York City for example, I would speculate that the resistance to what I do would not come from artists, musicians or the public, only from other tuners who can't do what I do. I've often been told as a way of putting down what I do that it is not new and has been tried and rejected before. Bill Garlick used to say that there is nothing that anyone could do today that had not already been done. I can accept that but I challenge anyone anywhere to show me any documentation which shows a temperament and octave arrangement that is the same as mine. When I see it, I'll change the name from EBVT with Tempered Octaves to whatever it was called before. I don't expect anyone will ever find it. It does play Beethoven more appropriately than ET does. It also plays Bach and virtually any other composer's music from any era and in any style more appropriately than ET does because of the Cycle of 5ths Key Color feature and the Equal Beating features which allow simple keys to sound purer than they really are. It avoids the harshness of most documented HT's and so it makes it suitable and appropriate for all kinds of music, more suitable and appropriate than ET. This is not just an opinion nor is there just anecdotal evidence for it. Everyone has the right to believe what they want and I don't expect very many people to take up my idea because you can't do it by just programming an ETD. You have to work at it and understand what it's all about. But that means that what I do is unique and of my own design. Anyone else is free and encouraged to come up with their own ideas too. A new CD will appear on the market in July which will feature 2 pianos tuned this way. The pianists and other musicians are all from New York except the leader who is from Madison, WI. Bill Bremmer RPT Madison, Wisconsin <A HREF="http://www.billbremmer.com/">Click here: -=w w w . b i l l b r e m m e r . c o m =-</A> ---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: https://www.moypiano.com/ptg/pianotech.php/attachments/77/b2/1b/6d/attachment.htm ---------------------- multipart/alternative attachment--
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