I have been tuning for over 33yrs - l learned the hard way by ear then started using the technology to " assist " me - and they do assist - but ultimately, the ear is the final check for all tunings- interesting video- one of the good ones on RU-vid
Excellent video! Very interesting use of minor thirds, I don't use them in my preferred sequence. I use major thirds and sixths with fourths and fifths to check and control, and I prefer sixths to be slightly faster than thirds inside. That's really fine temperament by the way, it's very smoothly progressing. As a tuner, it's like candy for my ears, so satisfying! :P
This video has given me second thoughts about tuning my newly acquired piano it is in tune with itself but overall about half a semitone flat but I love the colour of it I have turned Pianos in the past with great success but in this case I'm afraid I will lose something I won't be able to get back Hmmmmmm
It's really rather important to ask the rhetorical question "Why am I tuning this piano?" and another rhetorical question "What does equal spacing of notes achieve?". There is another way of tuning pianos that gives "colour" to the "chrom"atic scale, not in octaves but in tenths. Deliberately removing evenness in thirds makes music more interesting and can set many notes on the scale onto many of the harmonics of the lower strings. Increasingly people who have heard such tunings are falling out of love with perfect equal temperament.
ET Is the only way. UT, although interesting, struggles to handle modulations well. I mean it depends. Kirnberger is fine because all the 5ths are pure, and most Major thirds ( some minor thirds that have a natural sequencing of notes: B minor, E minor)
@@solidsnake9332 I would argue all instruments resonate in a certain key or relationship. The piano is sortof like a horn on some level, such that your "tuning" while performing is always relative to whatever key the piano is. "Is" as in the whole contraption (hit it with a hammer and see what key it) is. The interest in more justonic tunings is that you end up with a greater amount of stretch such that you might be able to play a wider range of pitches. (ex: the key of F# might be high on the extremities, low in the middle, but correct at the bass relative to an accompanying instrument) allowing a greater range of overall pitch control. The expense is that the error of a given note is always relative to a given key/octave/fundamental somewhere (usually mid bass) on the keyboard and "lays out" patterns of "sharp, correct, flat, etc" across the keyboard in seemingly haphazard ways at first, but it is surprisingly easy to learn once you know "which key" your piano is in, because the more you play it the more it will become that key. Like Bb horn: say a given accidental will "always" require the same amount of tuning adjustment relative to Bb. But the note Bb will "always" require the same amount of pitch adjustment relative to the key of Ab. Wierd things can happen on a justonic piano where you might play an A# or Ab even though you want an A natural, just because of the nature of the moment of music. Its worth exploring - its weird at first then it kindof clicks. Really good for vocal accompaniment, really hard for playing with guitars.
or you end up combining notes to make a single partial to "replace" or "pretend" that you played the note you didn't have available because you knew it was horrendously out of tune. It's not impossible in ET or on electronic instruments... its just a much less likely thing to stumble upon and begin to explore, I think. YMMV.
Lastly, ET can sound really non-negotiable. It sounds so "piano like" and rigid that sometimes it is hard to play another instrument along to because its like PIANO PIANO IS ALWAYS THE TRUTH!!! and the guitar or bass can sound sour in comparison. A full-stretched justonic piano is erroneous enough that its sortof like two violins: the other players "fill in" what the correct pitch "should be" and it can sound less demanding. ET also has a sortof IV "chord is speeding up" kindof motion.. which is okay, but a justonic piano can sound really tempo/pitch stable sometimes even though the chords change and lenience. Sometimes I feel like "every chord is a dominant chord" in ET, whereas chords and tuning and pitches and all that can seem completely arbitrary justonically. But something that sucks about justonic is that you can "get stuck in one key" for like a month straight and it's not like its impossible to play in other keys but your brain can just like start to perceive all notes relative to that one key and it can be hard to break out of.
No temperament has all pure 5ths. Oh what a wonderful world that would be if we could fit 12 perfect fifths in 7 octaves! :) Kirnberger III has 5 imperfect fifths, 4 of which are equally narrow, and 7 perfect fiths, 6 of which are in sequence (Db-Ab, Ab-Eb, ..., F-C). Only one of the major thirds is perfect, C-E, two are pythagorean, and there are three pythagorean minor thirds.
Hello, I tuned in to this video, by interest to a tuning of the piano other than the well tempered, and I couldn't figure whether I'm on the right spot for that, or in case you have another video on that subject? Other than the theoretical aspects (very interesting thank you) I'd have appreciated a musical example to also better grasp the impact on the timbre and the general sound dynamic in that supposed particular case. Thanks for your attention, kind regards Erik
The major third beating is something noticeable. the speed of the beating should steadily increase as you play progressively higher major thirds. tha'ts one way to know.
Other than being a purist, what reasons are there for not using a tuner to set the temperament in the center octave, and then tune octaves above and below note for note?
I'm not a tuner but surely in this age digital analysis of pitch is capable of determining precise equal intervals. Well designed software appears to be available also to determine and allow for Inharmonicity. I realise the great skill that is required to tune a piano by whatever means you set the pitch to ensure it is as accurate as possible and will hold. However apart from speed and convenience, would you say there is any other reason to tune aurally? @@butlertuningschool
an excellent aural tuner will get a better temperament than even the best current ETD's. However, in a few years I expect the future ETD's to equal the best aural temperament because they will use interactive tuning between all the temperament notes, rather than be forced to fit a pre-determined approximation as which the present ETD's do.
Great videos! The only thing I question is at 3:10 where you say the F-Ab min 3rd is beating faster than the Ab-C Maj 3rd. I counted with a metronome and it seems the opposite. To my ear the M3 is beating faster than the m3. Did you misspeak, or is my phone doing something funny on me? Which should it be? Thanks Rick! You’re the best!
my ears need a tuning. A quick question: I recently bought a C. Bechstein Model 10 upright circa 1910/11. What temperament would this piano be tuned to back then? Thanks.
Not being Mr. Butler, I would caution you in tuning A4 to 440Hz. Back then the international pitch was A-435Hz and equal temperament was never actually used until 1917. We really ruined it by going ET. That is why it was fought for so long. Tuners had their own systems during those yesteryears and the competition created better results than ET. Now they all like to do it the same......boring! Beethoven, Verdi, Debussy, Liszt and others all liked the pitch more like A-432Hz. It breathes life and texture into the music. ET at 440Hz is quite percussive and hard on our nervous system. It has been tested to contract the heart muscles causing excessive cardio stress.
Hey thanks for the video. I notice that when I tune the whole piano to a temperament, that when I'm finished, the middle is already slightly detuned. What is best method to tackle that problem? What is the best to do about this when removing the muting strip and start to tune the other strings? Because it will change pitch again.
This will happen more the piano was out of pitch to begin with. If the piano is close to start with, just a few cents off, this drift is minimal. I like to do a quick pitch raise with an ETD to get the piano close if more than 8 cents off, not worrying about unisons, and then do the fine tuning after. This helps prevent the pitch changing while tuning the fine tuning.
If you have a massively out of tune piano. Tune ~10 cents sharp. Then allow the piano to settle to that tuning for a few days. Come back again and check the tuning. If it's way flat then you must repeat and allow to settle for a couple more days and then you can proceed to proper full tune. Normally if the piano is well maintained you can do the ~ 10 cents sharp for the initial tune and complete the fine tune straight after.
Your bass notes would sound sharp and your treble notes would sound flat and neither would sound good when played together. This happens due to the partials (harmonics of the string) always being sharper than the fundamentals.
if you are playing a busted old piano that hasn't been tuned in years, and is unlikely to get a professional visit, and especially if you never cared or noticed those fine details of interval color that tuners care about [does this third beat faster than that third] then tuning the middle two or three octaves with a simple tuner will sound delightful. the other notes will need to be tuned to sound harmonious with the central keys ... there are various strategies, but pick one or even guess and your piano will be better than you are used to. and you can certainly fiddle with unison strings until they sound right. it's an incremental process fixing a badly out of tune piano, so even if you plan on calling a pro you are better off getting pitch into the ballpark over a period of weeks so the tune you pay for is on a stable piano. it's also possible that as you nudge your piano into life, a bit here a bit there and retighten the thing that was working yesterday, that you incrementally learn more about how real tuning works. with utmost respect to real tuners, the complexity of proper tuning represents an intimidating barrier to DIY, but there is a place for complete idiots working with chromatic tuners and rudimentary grasp of stretch and temper. imo this place is a combination of very poor tune and not caring overly. maybe it also depends on whether you think of tuning as open the piano, do the job and put everything away, or whether you're happy to leave the action exposed for three months and tweak notes and listen to beats when tv gets boring
Nice demonstration but watch out for your explanation! Don't forget that thirds and sixths are called "imperfect consonances" for a reason. So explain to us please what it means to be narrower or wider then a "perfect" major or minor third? Preference to the fifth is indeed good but a wider fifth than yours has a more lush and harmonious "difference tone". The narrower fifth has almost no "difference tone" and becomes more percussive, annoying and less interesting, almost dead sounding in comparison to the wider fifth. By using your narrow fifths you will only succeed in getting a 9ft. piano to sound like a 6ft piano. A big waste of money for the owner: but then he doesn't know better if he watches this video does he?
Perhaps I didn’t explain properly or you misunderstood. The first coincidental partials of the fifths in this video are nearly in unison. How could you make the fifths anymore ‘perfect’?