close enough>??

[Bill Ballard]

At 10:03 AM -0500 1/21/03, A440A@aol.com wrote:
>So, this raises the question of always needing two passes.  Is a one cent
>variation worth the extra time? I believe it is not, in this venue, where the
>pitch will change that much from day to day, depending on the lights,
>presence of the orchestra, HVAC fluctuations,etc. Had I been in a recording
>studio,  I would have done a rough pass first, but more for insurance than
>anything else.

Had this been a studio or a recital hall, you would have appreciated 
the fact that your most careful tuning could be done on something 
this close. If, in such circumstances, you knew that the piano to be 
prepared for that evenings concert of recording session had sagged as 
much as had the previous tuning on this rehearsal piano, you would 
have scheduled to go in the day before and do a pitch stabilization 
(such as the one you've described here).

There's no doubt that your single pass tuning pretty much nailed the 
requirements, given the circumstances. And a pitch raise of this 
style would be impossible to do aurally.

>  In so much of the debate over relative values of machines vs. ears,  we
>overlook the practical considerations.  I would like to see a comparison of
>results that pits two tuners against one another in a more real world
>setting. Something like, two pianos that are 8 cents flat, with maybe a
>cleaning crew in the hallway, and with a 1 hour deadline, etc.  Oh yea, it
>would also be good for these two tuners to have already tuned two or three
>pianos in the hours previous to the test, so fatigue factors get to be
>introduced, also.

I think they should simply be run in rounds of 60 minutes with a ten 
minute break between each round, for however many rounds they can 
complete. Also the score of record would be the final found which 
they managed to complete. Just to give the contestants a reason to 
prevent their efforts from flagging. Now that would be a sporting 
event. (Sorry.)

>Perhaps on a really poor
>scale, the results would be closer, but on a good piano, in good condition, I
>submit that the use of a machine allows far better results with far less
>stress.

(Dare I say it.) Tuning has hit the industrial age.

Bill Ballard RPT
NH Chapter, P.T.G.

"Talking about music is like dancing about architecture"
     ...........Steve Martin
+++++++++++++++++++++