Piano Tuning

Carter York · Post by **Carter York** » 16 May 2002 6:37 am

Hey y'all,

Is it feasable that one could use a chromatic tuner,and a tuning key, and
some patience and tune a piano, never
having done it before? Our piano is
way outta tune, and it seems do-able.

Thanks!

Carter

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 16 May 2002 7:00 am

If your piano is badly out of tune, and if you are are retired and have no other obligations, then it probably won't be any worse immediately after you spend a few days on it. But until you have tuned a few hundred pianos, you probably won't be able to leave the pins solidly seated so that it will stay in tune. In other words what you tuned yesterday will be out of tune today.

It's good to read about it first. You might prefer the old fashioned method of tuning fork and listening for beats. And if you haven't given up yet before tuning the middle range of the piano, a book will help you with the high and low range (stretching etc). So when you buy your hammer and mutes, pick up a tuning fork and look for a book.

Jim Cohen · Post by **Jim Cohen** » 16 May 2002 7:25 am

... and get yourself one of them "Jeff Newman tuning charts" too.

Greg Vincent · Post by **Greg Vincent** » 16 May 2002 7:33 am

Hey Earnest (or any of you other musical geniuses out there) could you explain why the octaves need to be stretched at the high and low ends of the keyboard?

I've read explanations before but they're always kinda vague about this.

Also, why doesn't a digital keyboard require this stretching? Is a Fender Rhodes typically tuned with stretched octaves? Or a Hammond organ?

Thanks,

-Curious in L.A.

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 16 May 2002 8:07 am

why the octaves need to be stretched at the high and low ends of the keyboard

It sounds better that way!

An ideal string can vibrate at many different frequencies, called harmoonics, and they are all multiples of a fundamantal frequency. For example the A string on a standard guitar has a fundamental frequncy of 110 Hz. You know how to sound a harmonic by touching a node as you pick, but in fact those harmonics are all there every time you pick or strike a string. You can change just how loud each harmonic is by picking closer to the bridge for example, and you can hear that as a different timbre.
So your ideal A string vibrates at 110, 220, 330, 440, 550, 660, 770, 880, etc, all added together. If you play a different A an octave higher at the same time, the combination sounds nice, like an octave should, because you hear the higher string's fundamental an octave higher at 220 Hz, and that reinforces the 220 Hz first harmonic of the low A string. If one string were a little out of tune, for example 221 instead of 220, you would hear a beat once per second, and that is not as pretty as no beats at all.

But this applies only to ideal strings. And of course there are no ideal strings. A real string has harmonics that are not exactly 2,3,4,5,6 etc times the fundamental frequency. This is called "inharmonicity" and it is most evident in the high strings on a piano which are short and stubby. The first harmonic is a little higher than twice the frequency of the fundamental. So when you tune the higher octave to be in tune with that first harmonic of the lower octave, you tune it a little higher than twice the frequency of the lower octave. And that is what they call stretching.

A Fender Rhodes tine assembly has a very different harmonic structure from a string, and I don't think they are stretched. I didn't stretch mine and it sounded OK.

Hammond organs are not stretch tuned at all. In fact the Hammond drawbars use an equal tempered scale to simulate the harmonic overtones, which gives the Hammond its unique sound.

Bob Blair · Post by **Bob Blair** » 16 May 2002 9:30 am

Having paid for and watched a number of piano tuners over the years, I have always felt that I was getting a heck of a bargain! Good piano tuners are highly skilled, and have invested a lot of time and energy getting that way!

Every couple of years I spend a few hours trying to tune up an autoharp we have hanging around - that is lots hard enough for me.

Greg Vincent · Post by **Greg Vincent** » 16 May 2002 11:27 am

Thanks Doug --that's fascinating stuff.
I knew you'd have the straight dope!

-GV

Bill Terry · Post by **Bill Terry** » 16 May 2002 11:52 am

I worked in a music store for quite a few years and we employed 4 or 5 piano tuners that did floor tunings for us. All they ever used was a mute, a tuning hammer and a tuning fork (this was mid-80's maybe that's old technology now?)

I could be in the back room and hear one of them tuning a piano and know which one it was by the 'style'. They all had their own little tried and true 'licks' or methods where they played a succession of intervals and/or octaves and tuned accordingly... a very individual thing.

Quite an art in my opinion....

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chas smith · Post by **chas smith** » 16 May 2002 1:30 pm

When I was in my early teens, I tuned my mother's piano, it never sounded quite the same after that. As I recall, she wasn't too happy about it.

Steve Frost · Post by **Steve Frost** » 16 May 2002 2:16 pm

We had our piano tuned and tweaked (lube, sticky keys adjusted) a couple of days ago, and I would have to agree- the $115 was well spent. Listening to the process from an adjacent room was a bit surreal- oddly I was reminded of the live Keith Jarrett CD. The tuning took about 2 hours, and this guy didn't waste a second of it. This is a substantial skill! My hat is off to anyone who can perform this tuning feat.

Donny Hinson · Post by **Donny Hinson** » 16 May 2002 5:32 pm

How can I say this delicately...

No!

Don't even think of trying it yourself. And there are several reasons...

Pianos and digital tuners don't go together! Anytime I've heard a piano tuned with a box (digital tuner) it sounded worse that it did before it was tuned. Been there...done that.

It will take you days, maybe weeks, attempting it yourself, and you will probably break something (a hammer or a string, or strip a peg hole). Piano repairmen are much more epensive than piano tuners.

Good piano tuners will do the job for less than $100, sometimes. It's still a bargain at twice that price!

Lastly...it can be very dangerous if you don't know what you're doing.

(Some things are best left to experts)[This message was edited by Donny Hinson on 16 May 2002 at 06:42 PM.]

chas smith · Post by **chas smith** » 16 May 2002 6:28 pm

Lastly...it can be very dangerous if you don't know what you're doing.

If you think getting snapped by the 3rd string, you know, bent string, spent string, is unpleasant...

Lincoln Goertzen · Post by **Lincoln Goertzen** » 19 May 2002 3:47 pm

My opinion is, Sure, try it, BUT watch someone who really knows what he is doing tune several pianos first.

I had the priviledge to watch a piano tuner tune pianos for two days. Definitely a skill reqiring endless hours of study and practice.

He said several things that are well worth noting- "A mediocre strobe-tuned job is far better than a mediocre ear-tuned job." Regarding strobes- "A lot of guys use them, but the accepted way is by ear."

I asked him how many strings he thought he had broken during his career, and he said, "about a hundred."

Earnest- that was very well explained.

Bill Terry- No, that's not old technology. All this tuner used was a long strip of felt (instead of a rubber mute) and two forks (he said he was the only one he knew that did this) and his hammer. He had many, many more tools that he always carried, but these were all he used for tuning.

Carter York- Anything else he told me is free knowledge, just send me an email. I don't have the years and years of experience that piano tuners do, but I know that I learned a lot from this man.

Lincoln

Bobby Lee · Post by **Bobby Lee** » 20 May 2002 4:20 pm

chas smith wrote:

When I was in my early teens, I tuned my mother's piano, it never sounded quite the same after that. As I recall, she wasn't too happy about it.

So, was that your first "prepared piano"?

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<img align=right src="http://b0b.com/b0b.gif" width="64" height="64">Bobby Lee - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs
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Donny Hinson · Post by **Donny Hinson** » 20 May 2002 5:40 pm

Pianos, like any other stringed instrument, are temper-tuned. Straight-up tuning all notes with a digital tuner or strobe will sound terrible. Because you would need a different tuning chart for most brands and types, it is unlikely you would find a tuner useful unless you had a LOT of experience...and in that case, you probably wouldn't need the electric tuner anyway!

Most all good piano tuners I have seen use their ear, a fork, and the "felt strip" dampening method.

chas smith · Post by **chas smith** » 20 May 2002 8:49 pm

b0b, it was an unplanned introduction to indeterminate tuning systems, and now that you mention it, it seems that the die was cast.

Carter York · Post by **Carter York** » 21 May 2002 7:24 am

Hey y'all,

Thanks for the replies, survey sez I'm callin' a piano tuner!!

Carter

John Kavanagh · Post by **John Kavanagh** » 22 May 2002 9:22 am

My experience squares exactly with Earnest Bovine's first comment: with a hammer and achromatic tuner, and some patience, you can make a badly out-of tune piano considerably better, but it won't last.

I bought a book, a wedge, and a hammer, but I still get ours tuned professionally once a year. I'm glad to be able to touch it up between times if something slips, though.

Raybob · Post by **Raybob** » 24 May 2002 10:39 pm

Each note of an electronic chromatic tuner is already in "equal temperment." When a good piano tuner is done with piano, every note should read perfectly in tune with the meter. The high notes 'sound' a little sharp and the lower notes 'sound' a little flat when they are tuned in 440 equal temperment but they are actually on pitch (the low A will be 27.5 cps (440/16).

If you did want to try tuning it yourself, you set the pins by taking the string just above pitch so that when tension is removed from the hammer, the note will 'settle' into pitch. If it's been a while since the piano was tuned, then after you've tuned a few octaves, the original strings you tuned will be flat from the extra tension on the soundboard. Sometimes you can end up tuning each string 3 times and then many 'touch-ups' after that.

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Good tunes

Jeff A. Smith · Post by **Jeff A. Smith** » 3 Jun 2002 4:41 pm

." When a good piano tuner is done with piano, every note should read perfectly in tune with the meter.

I must respectfully differ. If that were the case, all that someone would have to do, in order to replicate the work of a professional piano tuner, would be to master the correct hammer technique, and buy an electronic tuner and tune the fundamental frequency of every note straight to the tuner. In this case, professional piano tuning would be one of the biggest "scams" ever pulled off; or, these "tuners", including myself, would have wasted years of their lives-- learning how to do by ear what anybody could easily copy by using an electronic tuner in the way that common sense first suggests, to someone who has no knowledge of how "inharmonicity" sharpens the overtones in a piano string. (Earnest gives a good introduction to "inharmonicity" above.)

Even piano tuners that use an electronic tuner don't tune each fundamental frequency directly to the E.T. note on a tuner--good tuners don't anyway. With the old strobe tuners, they tune so that the fundamental frequencies are sharp as you go up the keyboard, and flat as you go down. If you wonder about this, get a copy of the Conn Strobotuner manual for piano tuning, to properly understand the method. This method uses overtones in a way similar to the ear method, which is what I personally use. The new electronic units for piano tuning also have methods for stretching octaves.

If a person tunes the fundamental frequency of each note directly to the pure E.T. note on a tuner in the way that was suggested above, yes, one could technically say that it is in tune; at least by one definition-the FUNDAMENTALS of each note indeed would be in tune with the pure, theoretical E.T.

But, piano strings each produce several audible notes besides the fundamental. (This, by the way, is why the simpler waveforms of many electronic keyboards can adequately be tuned in the "common sense" way, while acoustic pianos cannot be.)

The problem is that with a piano you play strings that really contain several notes, together with other notes that THEMSELVES contain several notes. Notes that are played together have what are called "coinciding harmonics." In other words, when the ear judges note groupings to be in tune or out of tune, it does so more in accordance with these "coinciding harmonics"; (which produce beat rates when out of tune with each other), than with the fundamentals, which are de-emphasized in accordance with which note groups are played together.

You are really hearing several different notes when you play one string by itself. The notes (harmonics) contained in this string that will become dominant in your perception, will do so because they "coincide" with another note's fundamental frequency , or one of its harmonics, and the two pitches produce an audible beat rate because of their proximity. So, a tuner must learn how to take into consideration these other notes, (harmonics), that are contained within each string. He cannot just tune according to the fundamental frequency.

Of course it isn't possible to get all of the overtones in a piano to match up, but a compromise must be reached that takes into account the coinciding harmonics of most common musical relationships. There is room here for personal artistic expression.

Now remember, due to inharmonicity, the overtones, (another word for "harmonics"), become progressively sharp in relation to their theoretically accurate pitch, to the extent that the stiffness of the string sharpens the pitch. (This is "inharmonicity.") Since overtones are created by the string breaking up into what are called "ventral segments," the higher overtones of a string are the sound of shorter string segments. These shorter string segments will be effected more by string stiffness than the lower overtones, or the fundamental, which is the sound made by the entire string length. This makes the higher overtones more sharp.

The fundamentals in the bass section are tuned flat, because the sharp overtones of those notes must sound good with the midsection of the piano. The treble section is tuned sharp, because those fundamentals must sound good when played with the sharp overtones of the midsection.

More could be said, but it would be hard to know where to start, or end.

Jeff [This message was edited by Jeff A. Smith on 03 June 2002 at 06:05 PM.][This message was edited by Jeff A. Smith on 04 June 2002 at 11:39 AM.]

Ron Randall · Post by **Ron Randall** » 3 Jun 2002 5:25 pm

The digital tuners we pickers often use are not accurate and not repeatable. They are quick and convenient. The Boss TU 12H was my favorite until I compared it to a Yamaha electric piano.

They do great when compared to piano A above middle C (440). Venture down or up an octave or two and you will most likely get some error. Is it the piano or the tuner?

Try one digital chromatic tuner against another, and you will see a difference. which one is right?

This article will show a graph of the 88 keys and how they are tuned relative to ET. This surprised me when I first saw it. You will see the stretch in the low and high notes.

http://www.izzy.net/~jc/PSTInfo/Temper.html

It can't be perfect. Just make it sound good!

William Steward · Post by **William Steward** » 4 Jun 2002 6:41 am

I have enjoyed this thread and offer my two bits. Some of the tuner's skill is in hearing the beats, knowing how to stretch the tuning (Reblitz explains this in tech terms), and being able to regulate the action/dampers of the instrument. My suggestion is if you have a friendly tuner, he may not mind you looking over his shoulder and asking questions. There are some good threads on SGF regarding 'just' intonation, playing with other instruments and tuning which apply to the piano. By the way Jeff I would like to get hold of a copy of a Conn Strobotuner manual...if you know of a source I would be grateful. This old piece of equipment is worth it's weight in gold since it displays the note harmonics (vs a simple digital tuner which shows only relative frequency). Good luck...don't give up just because there are 'specialists' out there...they had to start from scratch too!

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 4 Jun 2002 6:54 am

I would like to get hold of a copy of a Conn Strobotuner manual...if you know of a source I would be grateful.

I put Conn Strobotuner manual into Google and got a lot, for example http://www.mts.net/~smythe/conn.htm
was at the top of the list, which leads to http://www.mts.net/~smythe/st-6.htm
and http://www.mts.net/~smythe/st-11.htm
among others.

Jeff A. Smith · Post by **Jeff A. Smith** » 4 Jun 2002 10:29 am

I got an old book in a garage sale by Arthur Reblitz "Piano Tuning and Repair" (don't know if this still in print).

An excellent book, one of the main books that were recommended at the school I attended, and probably owned by the majority of piano technicians. I saw a new copy in a book store recently. If you want to get into a more detailed and musical look at tuning specifically, take a look at "Let's Tune Up" by John W. Travis. A true classic in the field. Travis also includes a great deal of music theory and history. What follows is his explanation of how stiffness in the strings causes "inharmonicity":

"The degree of stiffness characteristic of piano strings is dependent upon the length, density, and tension of the strings as well as upon the material from which they are made. Pianos do not all have strings with the exact same length, density, and tension. Therefore, the factor varies with different instruments."

This is why there should be no "Newman Chart" for pianos{!}

Travis continues:

(Remember that strings break up into segments and create overtones; the "dead spots" between these segments are called "nodes"-J.S.):

"Also, the nodes, (or "dead points") along the string influence the harmonic relationship of the segments of the string producing the upper partials, because of the space they occupy. Consequently, what would otherwise be the harmonic relationships to the generating tone are actually in excess of exact ratios and are, therefore, "inharmonic").

I got my copy of the Conn manual from Schaff Piano Supply, a firm most tuners do business with, a number of years ago. I'm not sure whether they can still get it or not. If you can't get a copy from the sources listed above, ask your tuner, or e-mail me and I'll try to help you. Yes, the Strobotuner does have unique capacities, as you suggest. The manual includes an instructive statement:

"If the job of tuning a piano were simply a matter of using the STROBOTUNER and making its bands "stand still" for 88 notes, even a person totally deaf could accurately tune. Alas, such is not the case-for to musical ears, such tuning would be aural chaos. The STROBOTUNER, being just a machine, needs help from a pair of musical ears (even one will do-if it's a good one.)"

One aspect of the "aural" method that the manual recommends using, is to alter the notes in the first (center) octave that is tuned away from pure E.T. if necessary, to make possible a progression of evenly accelerating beat rates, when one plays an interval such as the major third in a chromatically ascending pattern. That is a key part of what every aural tuner does. Once this center "temperament" octave is tuned, octaves are tuned in both directions away from it.

One thing I didn't make clear in my first post above, is that the "coinciding harmonics" of notes that are played together become prominent because a beat rate is created by overtones that are close enough together. These are the beat rates that tuners use in tuning. They are either established at specific rates of speed, or eliminated; it depends on which note groups are being tuned. I'm inserting a clarifying reference to these "beats" in my above post. (Obviously some of you already know about these beats.)

Jeff [This message was edited by Jeff A. Smith on 04 June 2002 at 11:44 AM.][This message was edited by Jeff A. Smith on 04 June 2002 at 11:49 AM.][This message was edited by Jeff A. Smith on 04 June 2002 at 11:56 AM.]

Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 4 Jun 2002 11:18 am

So, Jeff
What would your advice be for a steel player who will be recording with an acoustic piano player? (I am, next week) What can I do to mesh well with how the piano is (probably) tuned and the choices that I have on that continuum between ET and JI.

I think we've probably discussed before that I favor something roughly in between -- leaning toward ET for everything but thirds (and maybe sixths) and sweetening those as need be.

Since the piano track will already be recorded when I go in, my intention is to get E's in tune with it (hoping it hasn't changed in the interim) and tuning to the track (which, unfortunately, is in Bb - no hope for open strings on my guitar) by ear -- checking carefully with the bar at the 6th fret/no pedals and A+B at the 1st fret). I always try to concentrate on playing in tune first and the open tuning second, but if there's any principles I'm missing I'd like to know.

Any advice?

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