[Harp-L] Re: Harp-L Digest, Vol 49, Issue 30

["john" <jjthaden@xxxxxxxxx>]

     It's a blast when a couple of my interests coincide, this time, harmonicas and piano tuning.  Long ago, I assisted a veteran piano tuner in Long Beach CA for about six months.  Much of my work was refurbishing piano actions in the shop, but I also accompanied him on all tuning visits because, frankly, he could no longer hear the top octave and a half.  His deficit was profound, but this actually posed little problem -- what a tuner really needs is a well developed sense of timing, to know just how fast two strings beat against each other -- and he was not alone among tuners in relying in part on a strobe tuner, with much twisting of the "cents" dial, to properly stretch those uppermost notes.  But, as those who've used a strobe tuner know, the stripe pattern will stop when a pitch is correct, but also when it is wrong by a perfect interval, and it was to prevent such a gross mistuning that he had me along.
     We are lucky to have a Harp-L'er (Iceman) with real piano tuning experience and, as someone noted, reading his contribution and the Wikipedia entry gets a person a long way towards understanding a piano tuner's challenge.  Given the realities of string stiffness, and factors like the breaks in string behavior at transitions between plain and wound strings,  it's as much an art as a science -- the art of compromise.  I would just add one thing to what has been said.  Once they'd set the temperament octave in the middle of the instrument, the tuners I knew did not extend out from it by tuning perfect (or even slow-rolling) octaves (an exception was sometimes for the very lowest strings, where they might do it by listening for coincident partials).  Instead, they relied on some tried-and-true "A/B"-type interval tests, with names like the "3rd-10th test" and the "outside 6th-inside 3rd test", where success will be marked by equal beat rates at some easily perceivable speed, and also by checking beat rate progressions up and down the keyboard for intervals such as the 10th and the 17th -- both should slow down as you progress down the keyboard.  It takes valuable time to tell if an octave is beatless, and a slow roll can mean either slightly narrow or slightly wide, whereas faster beat speeds don't pose these problems.
     What I'd like to know is why such interval tests seem to work also for harmonicas (and in my experience, they do).  Are the overtones produced by a vibrating free reed at all close to a harmonic series, as is substantially true for the overtones of a vibrating string?  Or is it our ears that actually provide the overtone series for both reeds and strings, against which an out-of-tune interval will beat and sound bad?  Time to break out the oscilloscope....
-John Thaden
Little Rock, Arkansas USA    

>From: IcemanLE@xxxxxxx
>Subject: Re: [Harp-L] Re: Temperments of other instruments
>To: wmharps@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>Cc: harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx
>Message-ID: <d00.1a8d1a10.341ef098@xxxxxxx>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
>
> 
>In a message dated 9/16/2007 2:08:06 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
>wmharps@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
>
>Also,  the piano tuner makes choices in tempering the tuning that help 
>to  diminish the audible effect of the disonnance, by spreading the  
>compromises to intervals that are less likely to be  used. 
>
>
>The success of the piano tuner is based on his personal philosophy in how  he 
>does his work. Tuners that spread the compromises to intervals that are less  
>likely to be used are less likely to be called back to tune for serious  
>musicians. The idea is to spread the 24 cents amongst 12 intervals - squeezing  
>each one 2 cents. This should be done equally.
> 
>ET is how you set up the temperament of the tuning - it is the basis for  the 
>first octave of 12 notes that you set as the standard for the instrument.  
>This first octave usually takes place around middle "C" on the piano. I use the  
>"F" below middle "C" up to the "F" above middle "C" as my reference. It was 
>how  I was taught.
> 
>Stretching the tuning is a separate entity. You can set up beat less  octaves 
>the full range of the piano. The human ear tends to hear the higher  notes as 
>being flat when compared to those in the mid range. Stretching the  tuning up 
>at the top gives a boost. Some tuners stretch the last octave and a  half to 
>ridiculous lengths. 
> 
>My philosophy was to tune octaves beginning in the upper mid range by  
>setting them not as beatless, but as beginning to open up to one slow rolling  beat 
>which never completes - the first third or half to "WOW". Carrying this to  
>the top end gave me everything I liked as well as everything all my clients  
>liked. I was complimented by Ramsey Lewis and Dr. Billy Taylor on my high end  
>tuning expertise. I was even asked by Steinway to consider moving to LA and  
>take over the tunings of all the "stars" and high profile musicians and a lot of  
>studio gigs, as their resident long time best tuner was getting ready to 
>retire. 
> 
>Heading into the bass section, tuners will decide whether they like a solid  
>fundamental with vibrating overtones or a smoother sustained sound with a roll 
> to the fundamental. Since you don't usually sustain low octaves and listen 
>into  them for long periods of time in actual performance, my philosophy was to 
>set  the first overtones beatless and let the fundamental roll slowly. This 
>cleared  the air more for the upper overtones to sound smoother.
> 
>The Iceman