Chipping

[Elwood Doss]

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Woe to the person who can type, yet, can't write with a pen and paper.
It's ironic that schools still teach children to print, then write in
cursive, long before they are taught to use a computer keyboard.  There
are some things that are basic to any skill and, in my opinion, aural
tuning, especially the temperament octave is one of them.  I use email,
but I would not take anything for my ability to write in cursive.  I
have never used an ETD to tune.  I waited 20 years to get the
opportunity to learn how to tune aurally and tuning with an ETD would
take the fun and challenge from it-it would become just a job.  If I had
wanted to tune with an ETD, I would have purchased a "Strobo-Conn" tuner
in 1970 and started tuning.=20

=20

Oh, this was about chipping....

=20

Joy!

Elwood

=20

Elwood Doss, Jr., RPT

Piano Technician/Technical Director

Department of Music

145 Fine Arts Building

The University of Tennessee at Martin

Martin, TN  38238

731/881-1852

FAX: 731/881-7415

HOME: 731/587-5700

  _____ =20

From: alan forsyth [mailto:alan@forsythalan.wanadoo.co.uk]=20
Sent: Saturday, October 08, 2005 9:20 PM
To: Pianotech
Subject: Re: Chipping

=20

I had six bloody months of it at college; the main purpose was I think
for "industrial training".=20

Chipping also of necessity meant that you had to be able to tune and
recognize semitones.

Also, the chipping process seems to train your ears to filter out
extraneous noises, by virtue=20

of the action and dampers being removed, which has been of great benefit
in the real world;

I can tune in noisy situations, except where there is a vacuum cleaner
of course!

=20

"PTA do not require a chipping test...."

=20

I wonder though if they require that a muting strip is not used in
tuning the temperament?

One thing that puts me off the PTA is why should I take a test when I
have qualified after 3 years=20

full-time at a college? And there is also the requirement that no ETD's
are allowed even though=20

it was a compulsory part of the course at college; in this day and age,
that's like writing a letter=20

with pen and paper instead of using e-mail.

=20

AF

	----- Original Message -----=20

	From: Byeway222@aol.com=20

	To: pianotech@ptg.org=20

	Sent: Sunday, October 09, 2005 1:46 AM

	Subject: Chipping

	=20

	 =20

	'Chipping-up' has always been the bedrock of tuning training on
the full-time courses here in UK.  The first series of  tests was the
completion of a pitch raise in decreasing time scales. I really can't
remember what the ultimate goal was, but it was probably something like
20minutes to raise the pitch a resonable amount using just a plectrum on
a strung back.
	The guys who really perfected the technique were those who
worked in piano factories and went through a phenomenal number of newly
strung backs in a day.   It was a very depressing sight to see a guy,
often blind, sitting in often a smallish room with scores of strung
backs stacked like library books beavering away non-stop.    I would
have thought that this has been the practice in USA in the past, before
automated stringing in factories.
	However, there has always been a certain amount of controversy
as to its real value to  'on the road'  tuners.   My own experience, and
that of many tuners, is not having pefected a consistant and useful
commercial speed using this technique.  You have to be doing a lot of it
for it to be time saving.  I think most of us perfect our own way of
action-in pitch raising.
=09
	One of the initial values of 'chipping-up' in the college
training system, however, is to quickly familiarise the new student with
the geography of the strung back and to encourage a fast and confident
initial approach to the whole business of tuning.  It is acknowleged
that this is an initial 'rough tuning'  and there is no point in hanging
about and getting neurotic about it being perfect.  Just get on with it.
Accuracy will develop with technique and experience. It really is an
effective way of negating the over-cautious aspects in the personality
of many beginner students.  I wish I had appreciated this more when I
did my own training.

	=20

	The previous post is right in saying that the PTA do not require
a chipping test, and their standard test appears to be OK.  My own
experience of the PTA has been a mixed one, and although i have never
been a member, I did attend some pretty good 3 day conventions in the
1980's.  I would doubt though, that even now, their conventions have
such a broad based character as the US ones.

	=20

	Ric


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