David Andersen wrote: > Hi, folks----I got a beautiful letter from Virgil Smith today about my > tuning article in this month’s Journal; I’m so happy he liked it, and > it gave me a thrill to be acknowledged by him. > > What did you guys think of it? I’d love some feedback, praise, scorn, > whatever....... > > David Andersen You asked for it: "Cracking" a unison sounds to me like nothing different from tuning a truly beatless unison, which we all strive for anyhow, but maybe don't actually accomplish on each and every tuning, except perhaps on an extra-special "concert tuning" on which we spend two or more hours. Under "A Few Helpful Hints," you say the "true beat" doesn't appear for 3-5 seconds after the two notes are played, especially in the fourths. But two paragraphs hence, you say the fourths all beat at 1.5 - 2.5 bps! If they're beating that fast, how can it take 3 - 5 seconds for the ("true," whatever that is) beat to appear? In the same paragraph, you say A3-D4 and C4-F4 might even beat faster than we think would be right. What's "right"? I assume we're tuning equal temperament, in which case fourths in the temperament area beat at about 1 bps. 2.5 bps for a fourth would be quite noticeable, I would think. But with all three strings open (which, in the end, when doing a final check, is how we would listen to the piano anyhow), you say the beats slow down a bit. I don't agree that having the unisons tuned will slow down the beat of the interval! Do they actually slow down or just seem to? The terms you use to describe widths of intervals, such as: swellingly beatless, almost beatless, very slightly narrowed, a tiny bit, a frog hair, slightly, a hair, a little, ever-so-slightly more, quite a bit more, slow roll, a bit, slower than, just a bit, super fast, and slightly narrow, are all too subjective to actually use in precisely setting a temperament, in my opinion. Without defining what these means in terms of beats per second, temperaments tuned with these guidelines by several different tuners probably would all come out differently. Then in the third-to-last paragraph, you say, "If all the fourths on the piano are beating the same slow roll, then the stretch will be exactly on the money out to the extremes." I really don't believe this is true, and certainly not for all pianos. The beat speeds of fourths and most other intervals increase slightly as one ascends the scale in a piano tuned to equal temperament. And is there really such a thing as the stretch being "exactly on the money"? Different degrees of inharmonicity in different pianos require different amounts of stretch. Also, I know that the "Virgil Smith phenomenon" has been demonstrated, or supposedly "proven" with an ETD, but in my opinion, it is so small that's it's negligible. Maybe one in a hundred pianists, if that, would even detect it. If you're regularly tuning for the world's most demanding concert artists, it may be something to consider. But for the spinets, consoles, and 5-foot grands those of us "in the trenches" deal with every day, and which almost all require a pitch raise because they get tuned only every 4 to 7 years, nah! I'm sorry. It's just not worth all the extra time "cracking" unisons when they're going to drift out of tune by next week anyhow, because of the pitch raise. But I'll try the temperament sequence, and maybe reserve the technique for the next time I tune in Carnegie Hall or Lincoln Center. As an aside, though I respect Virgil Smith, his accomplishments, and long-time career, tuning for top clients, and acknowledge that in his mind, he knows what he's talking about, I have yet to see an article that explains scientifically what is actually happening with the partials and beats in what he calls the "natural beat" (of all the partials sounding simultaneously, as opposed to listening to just two coincident partials). I have yet to hear that "natural beat." I can play an interval, with or without unisons tuned, and hear the various beatings of various coincident partials, and usually one is strongest, but if that's what he means, he should say so. If anybody else knows what the so-called "natural beat" is in scientific terms, i.e, exactly what is being listened to, what its beat speed is, etc., or if its an entirely different phenomenon that only a select few can hear, why don't they write an article and clue the rest of us, or at least me, in? --David Nereson, RPT
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