S&S D Duplex -- Long & Meandering

[Delwin D Fandrich]

----- Original Message -----
From: <Duplexdan@aol.com>
To: <pianotech@ptg.org>
Sent: November 20, 2002 9:47 PM
Subject: Re: S&S D Duplex -- Long & Meandering


> Del,
>
> as I understand you, that tuning the duplex scale is a waste of time and
> indeed destroys piano tone. Let's have a match!
>

Then you haven't been reading what I've had to say on the subject. Please do
so before you put words in my mouth and/or on my computer screen. While I do
believe -- and have repeatedly both written and taught -- that there are
better ways of designing pianos using what has been learned about soundboard
function over the past several decades, I don't believe I have said the
technology "destroys" piano tone.

No, the two things I take issue with you over are, first, your claim that
switching from the tuned backscale to the vertical hitch arrangement somehow
caused the demise of the Baldwin company. This claim has no basis in fact
and, at best, is  misleading. The reasons for the Baldwin company's demise
can be easily discerned by anyone willing to spend a few minutes studying
the management the company endured during the last 20 or so years of its
existence.

And, second, I have said that I don't believe any form of backscale tuning
will give the sustain increases you have claimed. A few months back you were
claiming these increases to be between 300% to 500% (conservatively). I now
see that you have apparently become a bit more conservative yourself and are
only claiming increases of 100% to 300%. Even these figures I find
astonishing. We currently have a Steinway A3 in the shop without a tuned
backscale that has a usable sustain time at C-64 of between 12 and 15
seconds (depending on how you measure sustain time). Even your more
conservative claims would have this increasing to somewhere between 24
seconds and 45 seconds just by tuning the backscale!

Please forgive me, Dan, if I find this to be just a bit incredible. While
you claim to have achieved these results in your demonstrations this has not
been supported by the one person on this list who has attended your
demonstration and written about it. (Were you going to respond to that by
the way?)

As may be, results of this magnitude would have rocked the industry. Not
just from the inception of the technology but the rocking would still be
going on. With treble sustain like this we would never hear complaints about
weak and percussive (i.e., short sustain) killer octaves and we'd all be out
there feverishly tuning away on the bloody things. Unfortunately we have
never seen results of this kind -- not then, not now -- and the world is
littered with pianos having weak and percussive killer octaves that no
amount of duplex tuning is going to solve.

Now, does tuning the backscale alter the tone of the instrument? Of course
it does. As to whether or not this is desirable is another issue. Obviously,
for you it is, but for me it is not. Nor do I care for the problems
introduced by the technology and I really don't like the sound of the
slightly out-of-tune 'tuned' backscale. Which is how most of them end up
shortly after being tuned. And which is why so many of them end up muted
out. As to whether or not this technology "destroys" the tone of a piano is
surely subjective and, I think, overly strong.

Finally, I'm not really sure what it is you want to have a match over. If
you're going to prove that tuning the backscale alters the tone of the
piano -- you win. It does. If you are promising to deliver on your earlier
claim of sustain time increases of 300% to 500% (conservatively) -- now this
would surely be interesting. I'd love to see a piano -- any (non-electric)
piano -- with a C-64 sustain time of over half a minute. But I hardly need
to engage in your pissing contest to see if you can deliver on this. I'll
just attend your class the next time we appear at the same venue -- indeed,
as I've said before, I'm looking forward to it.

Del