Temperament use, (was Feldman's piano)

[Avery]

Thanks, Ed. Great post.

Avery

At 07:56 AM 3/26/2007, you wrote:
>  Avery asks:
><< I "believe" that Ed Foote does a LOT of HT's with jazz. Right, Ed?>>
>
>           There are only about 5% of my customers still using strict equal
>temperament.  I don't have any that have stayed in 1/7 comma tuning, but the
>Coleman 11 is popular with the songwriters and jazz players, as well 
>as the Moore
>and Co.  tuning.
>      These tunings are not recognized as unequal, by the musicians.  The
>pianos are simply regarded as more resonant and fuller 
>sounding.  Beegee Adair, a
>well-know jazz artist,(a Steinway Artist,too), has remarked that there is
>something about a local piano I lease to a jazz club that always 
>just puts her in
>a great frame of mind, saying "I've never had a bad night on that piano".  It
>is in a Moore and Co. right now, but has been in the Broadwood or Coleman
>tuning, before. I have never used ET on that piano.
>        One recording studio here that uses a new Kohler and Campbell
>piano,(not a very exciting instrument), has several of the session 
>players saying it
>is their favorite piano in town because it has such a great 
>sound.  They don't
>even register that it is in a Coleman tuning, but it has something the other
>pianos in studios don't.  (the C7 is the standard studio piano around here).
>     Peter Serkin used a 1/7 comma meantone tuning last week for a Brahms
>Concerto.  Nobody mentioned noticing that it was a different tuning, 
>but rather,
>how good the piano sounded.  That is more extreme than I tune,but in that
>setting, it did just fine.
>        There is something, imho, lacking about exact ET that musicians don't
>even know they want, until they get it.  I don't do a lot of talking 
>about the
>changing, so the piano gets the credit.  I do get the highest price for my
>tuning here, and the majority of my customers are professional 
>pianists, and I
>don't use ET very much. It has been that way for 15 years, so I don't think I
>can be accused of using smoke and mirrors.
>      I do have a simple challenge:  with two identical pianos, allow me to
>tune one and anybody else tune the other in ET,(I don't care if it 
>is the best
>tuner from any of the makers) and then compare any kind of music on both of
>them.  I have done this repeatedly and the overwhelming majority of listeners
>have preferred the non-ET piano.  Strict equal just doesn't hold up 
>in side by
>side comparisons and a growing number of tuners are finding that out.
>Regards,
>
>
>Ed Foote RPT
>http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/index.html
>www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html
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