source file: mills3.txt Date: Thu, 18 Sep 1997 16:46:21 +0200 Subject: Pianos, weather,temper From: A440A@aol.com Mark writes: > There's a lot of out-of-tune pianos out there, but as long as the keys > have drifted equally (usually in the "flat" direction), it doesn't seem > to affect the emotion of the piece. (Of course if the keys have drifted > unequally, it's time to get the piano tuned, The piano is an untunable instrument, and the best tuners are the ones that made the best compromises. This is what makes it hard to define standards. There are two ways that pianos "drift" out of tune. A poor tuner's work is usually marked by single note unisons being out of tune, as well as uneven progressions in the beat rates of the thirds. This tuner should be avoided. The other "out of tuneness" is due to seasonal weather changes, which cause wholesale pitch movement, most easily heard in the octaves. If you must tune to a "bent" piano tuning, determining a center is not always best done by the A number 49. There may be a different pitch at a different place on the keyboard. (for ease, all notes on the piano are referred to by number 1-88, i.e middle C is C40). It is important to understand that the bass strings on a piano are anchored on a separate bridge. This smaller bridge doesn't respond as dramatically as the longer treble bridge, so the bass section of the piano will usually be closer to the originally tuned pitch. A tuned piano in a dry environment will go sharp as moisture is introduced, but it will not go sharp all together. The bass section will exhibit some rise,(big pianos have the bottom 20 notes on the bass bridge, smaller pianos have 26), but the notes just above the bass, i.e., on the very bottom end of the treble bridge, will be dramatically sharp. This is the point of greatest change. From there up, the rest of the piano will be sharp in varying degrees. This whole thing works in reverse, also. Tune in the middle of summer, and by mid winter, there is this huge flat section, right above the bass. It makes all the octaves that span these two bridges, (span span??) sound terrible. As far as flatness having less emotional effect than being sharp, I must wonder. The causes and degrees of emotional response in music are so subjective, that more of a comparitve tool that the drifting piano needs to be used, (IMHO). > My own pet theory is that as you listen to music, your ears accept >the imperfections in tuning that are presented to them, and knows >what was "meant". So the same idea/emotion/whatever comes >across, whether you're using equal temperament/meantone >temperament/just intonation/whatever. Temperament is a different perpective than just being out of tune. However, some temperaments sound "out of tune" to some ears. This is not uncommon when you begin getting out on the edge of any thing. To wit: I know some wine drinkers that like their wine dry; not sorta dry, but skull and crossbones, battery-acid, twist-your-face-off DRY! I don't want to get used to it! I know people that like their steaks so rare you can hear them moo. I know very wealthy people with nice pianos in homes decorated poorly enough to make Elvis wince. However, I like Beethoven on a Werckmiester........ (and yes, I have seen others cringe at the same. At some point, my "Stairway to Heaven" becomes someone else's "Highway to Hell". So hey, what is taste but a yardstick we are all on? Since we can only measure distances from ourselves to the places of others, the validity of our observations is only as good as our understanding of our own position. For locating help, I have gone back to Vallotti, et al. Others here have gone forward into ET territory with buckets of math . The emotional circuitry in a lot of Classical keyboard music is such that alteration of the tuning fundamentally alters the effect of hearing and feeling it. Use of a meantone tuning would cause much of Beethoven's music to come unhinged, with dissonant occurances in the strangest of places, and little modulatory graduations among near keys. In 12TET, his music becomes static, even tedious. His keyboard music uses the irregular, circulating temperaments of the late 18th century to do their work. In a more modern view, Gershwin's compositions on a Justly tuned keyboard would probably lose some of their flow, no? Gregorian music doesn't work as well in ET as in pure pythagorean, does it? Can you chant your way to heaven in ET, or are pure fifths the only thing that will get you there? I guess the point I would like to offer is that there is an emotional package in much classical music that doesn't get delivered if the tuning is not right. This value, formed by the varying use of consonance and dissonance, may be neglible to some, but to others it is a major reason for listening. Ramble on.......... Regards, Ed Foote Precision Piano Works Nashville, Tn. SMTPOriginator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu From: kukula@synopsys.com Subject: missing fundamental PostedDate: 18-09-97 21:31:57 SendTo: CN=coul1358/OU=AT/O=EZH ReplyTo: tuning@eartha.mills.edu $UpdatedBy: CN=notesrv2/OU=Server/O=EZH,CN=coul1358/OU=AT/O=EZH,CN=Manuel op de Coul/OU=AT/O=EZH RouteServers: CN=notesrv2/OU=Server/O=EZH,CN=notesrv1/OU=Server/O=EZH RouteTimes: 18-09-97 21:31:47-18-09-97 21:31:48,18-09-97 21:31:00-18-09-97 21:31:01 DeliveredDate: 18-09-97 21:31:01 Categories: $Revisions: Received: from ns.ezh.nl by notesrv2.ezh.nl (Lotus SMTP MTA v1.1 (385.6 5-6-1997)) with SMTP id C1256516.006B4524; Thu, 18 Sep 1997 21:31:40 +0200 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA06800; Thu, 18 Sep 1997 21:31:57 +0200 Date: Thu, 18 Sep 1997 21:31:57 +0200 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA06797 Received: (qmail 25430 invoked from network); 18 Sep 1997 18:35:38 -0000 Received: from localhost (HELO ella.mills.edu) (127.0.0.1) by localhost with SMTP; 18 Sep 1997 18:35:38 -0000 Message-Id: <199709181826.LAA20400@sunatg3> Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu