GPM:

Let give you another option for comparisons. I can construct and publish beat rate curves for a tuning given the iH and either cents deviation or frequencies. This would show objectively what octave types are tuned where.

I already have an iH curve for a BB, but if you have the iH numbers for your piano, those could be used instead. Up to you, it’s just an offer.

I listened to the two recordings, but didn’t want to give what are really just impressions. Knowing which tuning is which could easily influence my opinion. I don’t have time to set up a blind test. But my probably biased opinion is that the RCT bass is better (being more harmonious) and the Stopper treble is better (being more melodious.) And in between, I don’t know. They are just different.

Hi Jeff,

Sounds great. As I get closer to doing this in December I will PM you for instructions etc.

I can see where knowing which ETD is which could influence opinions....that's another good reason to perhaps first present it as a question to try and guess which ETD is which.

Your comment on the bass of the 2 tunings is interesting. I remember when I was re-tuning to the Stopper in the bass from the RCT, as I reached the last 6-7 bass notes, I noticed there was more of difference in those notes compared to the RCT. The rest of the Stopper tuning for the whole piano did not deviate as much from the RCT tuning.

Here is another selection that might be good to include for hearing the bass integration between the different ETD's. This is only in the RCT version: "Theme from ET" http://www.box.net/shared/gb6hc6pt4u I recorded this selection with a different mic position. They were right above where the music desk would be, (it was removed) and the mics were in the X-Y crossed position. You can hear more action noise etc, but it gives a different perspective.

Thanks for your comment Gardzar.

Hi, you mention using a very simple ETD with pre-determined stretches and no ability to sample notes. I've seen several piano tuning software with those pre-determined stretches (ex. Grand Piano 6 to 7 ft, Vertical Piano 39 to 51 inches, etc). I've never tuned using pre-defined tunings. How would you describe these pre-defined tunings compared to those by ETD's that allow you to sample notes? Just wondering...

Grandpianoman, I am so glad you are willing to tune the piano in the EBVT III! I will send you the specs as soon as I can get around to it. The kind of comparison you want to do, a "blind" comparison is a very interesting idea! It has been proposed many times over the years but rarely anything close has ever happened. The last time I remember the EBVT being compared to other temperaments including ET tuned by Virgil Smith was in 1998 and the EBVT (original version) won! (On a 4:1 vote of raised hands). And that was with an audience of piano technicians at a PTG convention!

Another PTG colleague of mine for whom I have great respect and who is a university technician and who has another favorite mild Victorian style temperament, has often commented that when he presented ET and a Victorian temperament side by side on similar pianos, he would consistently get a favorable reaction to the Victorian temperament.

Now, let me say first, that I don't expect you to like or prefer the EBVT III to the way you customarily tune. Obviously, you are a fine pianist and have also learned to tune very well with an ETD. For many technicians, the slightest departure from ET simply sounds "out of tune". I know that and accept it. But if my customers who are not tuners consistently had the same reaction, I would have abandoned non-equal temperament long ago. But the fact is, I have not tuned in ET now for more than 20 years.

I like Jeff's idea too, that only intervals and such be played in various ETD programs but I also know that it would require you to tune the piano again in all of the various ways to produce files. This should come later and should be done but only when you can find the time for it.

There are other points to consider about such trials. Some people resent being presented with a tuning in a different temperament or style and not being told about it. They feel that there is only one kind of tuning and if "something else" is provided, it is an act of deception.

A comparison as you have suggested can serve to cut through all of that. If you label the files simply as #1, #2, #3, etc., and most people guess incorrectly, it will really reveal personal bias against what really is appealing.

If you set it up so that listeners are to try to guess which is which and which they prefer, I am sure that you will receive an interesting mix of results. People will have subjective descriptions and preferences but will more than likely guess incorrectly more than half of the time. That is my hypothesis, anyway.

It will really be interesting to see where the original ETD you used falls into the mix since it was so thoroughly condemned by those who read a description of its premise. I am among those who were highly doubtful that it could produce an acceptable sounding tuning. Wouldn't it be interesting if it, in fact, got a substantial number of comments about "warmth", "soul", "musicality", "wood vs. plastic", etc.? I am not suggesting that I expect that but the results of a totally "blind" comparison will surely be interesting from an audience of mostly piano technicians and others who are at least audiophiles and/or pianists.

Another point to consider is that the way a piano is tuned is expected to influence the way a pianist may play it. I have witnessed many times over how a high caliber artist has reacted to a piano tuned in a temperament far stronger in inequality than the EBVT III. The piano was otherwise very expertly regulated and voiced. When the artist sat down to play, they heard "other voices" from the piano they had never encountered before and instantly adapted to them. The piano "spoke" to these artists as no other piano had ever before and they went with the phenomenon and played a unique recital that was never heard before and would likely never be heard again.

In the case of these trials, you will have recorded the piece as you normally play it but the differences in tuning will manifest themselves regardless of your technique. It will not, therefore, be a totally valid comparison but a valuable one nevertheless.

I recall, for example, a German pianist who was asked to play a Beethoven sonata tuned in the EBVT III at the PTG convention in 2006. When asked about his reaction to it, he expressed in his imperfect version of English, "When I tried to make the expression, I suddenly realized the expression was already there for me". That statement revealed a lot to me but clearly, when one kind of pianistic technique is applied to several different styles of tuning, the whole concept is invalid (out the window).

Nevertheless, an experiment such has been proposed will be interesting for its results. After all of the guesses have been received and compiled, a list of the recordings and which tuning styles they were actually in with comments invited should be posted. Will it change anyone's mind? Will it open anyone's mind? We will all have to wait to see. If nothing more, I hope it will instill in people's minds to "never say never".

Its interesting how these various tunings from different ETD's are being commented on from the recordings of musical pieces. Would the comments be any different (from the techs at least) if a series of various interval progressions were recorded comparatively similar to the aural tests we commonly use to tune? It might shed some light on more than this ETD vs that, and answer the question why the end result of one is more pleasing or has different subtle characteristics than the other when used to make music. On a different lighter note, I had this strange dream last night where I was 30 years older and was tuning a piano note by note playing a little Bach, then some jazz, then some pop, no interval checks though....weird.

Emmery, I agree that an interval study would have value and I think it should be done but remember that Grandpianoman would have to tune that piano again with all of the devices. As technicians, we do a lot of interval and other technical study. That leads to the condition we sometimes get into where we no longer hear music, we only hear beats!

What I find interesting is that even among many piano technicians, people will say upon hearing a piano tuned in the EBVT III, "I can't tell the difference between that and ET." When I went down to the Fazioli dealer in Chicago a few years ago and tuned two fine pianos in the EBVT, all entirely by ear, that is exactly what he said. He was rather disappointed. He had been expecting something startling (at least, startling to him) and he didn't hear any difference at all.

From the recordings on my website (none of which are really that good but it is all I have that I can use on there), Jeff quickly proclaimed that he would never tune that way. I wonder if Jeff and many others would actually correctly identify which tuning is the EBVT III?

There should be 2 questions and grandpianoman can compile the results: Identify the tuning and then tell which you liked best and why? I'd bet that not one person identifies all of them correctly. Wouldn't it be something if I misidentified the EBVT? I wouldn't rule it out.

While I think I probably would identify the EBVT correctly, I know that when presented with another very mild ET (Moore, I think), I was wrong more than half the time. For me, there was not a lot of difference between the two. When the music gets complex, shades of temperament aren't heard so clearly as they are when you're playing intervals as a technician would. A local colleague has salon concerts at his dealership on a regular basis and has high caliber artists perform. He uses the 1/7 comma meantone (a far stronger temperament than the EBVT). Never once has an artist ever said anything about the temperament or tuning but they often did say something positive about the piano.

I am also interested in hearing the piano tuned by the original ETD that grandpianoman used. It was condemned by several people. It works on an entirely different concept than the other devices. But would I or many others really be able to pick it out of the crowd? Would people who previously said they preferred the Stopper or the RCT now misidentify them and say the same things they did before but about the wrong piano? Would people think the EBVT is ET and the ET is the EBVT? I surely think some will.

It will all be very interesting and fascinating.

We'd all like to attend a live event like this but that would be nearly impossible. On here, grandpianoman's great piano and great recording devices can give as a virtual alternative.

Bill, you might have missed the part about grandpianoman's set-up being a player-system? For just the reasons you describe, I've been thinking about the yamaha players at the school to use for tuning testing playback... It takes player perfomance out of the mix and just lets the tuning speak for itself.

The beauty of a recorded test is that the same piano is used, hopefully with the same equipment set up to record. By using a player system, the artist interacting with the tuning is taken out of the picture. (though that is a HUGE part of why some people prefer alternate temperament, it leads them to other interpretations than they normally would chose.)

I actually prefer to avoid "tuning" test intervals during the listening phase. I do prefer some very simple pieces, as well as those that span the range of the keyboard to get a feel for the musicality of a tuning - and how well it fits the particular instrument.

Ron Koval
chicagoland

Hi Bill,

I was just going to post that my recordings are not me playing. I wish I could play that well! The "LX" system is what is at work here, as well as the "Ampico" system. www.live-performance.com All the recordings I have posted here were played by professional pianists, Earl Wild, Brian Pezzone, etc.

Ranger, the ETD I first used and posted about here awhile back, was made by a retired engineer. He only made a small number, and is not making them any more due to lack of parts. He is however, experimenting with a new version of this tuner!......if I hear anyting about it, I will post it here. He has promised me a trial run with it if it works! A lot of info about my original ETD is in this post: http://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/642321/1.html


The LX playback system does indeed take the variable human interpretation out of the mix, as it plays everything the same way, all the time. Whatever interpretation that pianist played the day of the recording, that is what you hear every time the file is played back. The same is true for the Ampico rolls.

This is turning into quite a project, and I am looking forward to doing it! Before I start it, I would like to get your opinions on how to set it up, procedures etc, and how to present it here on PW.

I admit that my opinion was not based on a side by side comparison. But if few can tell the difference then what use is it anyway? I will say that I found a sample of a Vallotti temperament on the web and felt that my sensibilities were being assaulted. With the EBVT III I was expecting to hear something that I would recognise as cyclic. (Fourth and Fifth tuning is cyclic by nature.) What I experienced was something different. So, in my own mind I was evaluating objectively. I did not hear what I expected.

But really, this started out as a comparison on ETDs. If GPM chooses to expand this into comparisons of temperaments, fine. But lets not pressure him.

All:

Even listening to beats, which is a more objective way to evaluate the stretch than listening to music, is still a subjective test. I mean, how can you decide just where the 4:1 octave turns from wide to narrow, or if one tuning had faster beating 6:3 octaves in the tenor than another?

That is why I am suggesting doing a mathematical analysis of the tunings to determine the beat rates. Then the beat rates can be used to calculate the stretch. The beat rate curve of each octave type and the twelfths can be compared between different tunings. All that is needed is the iH curve (which can be constructed from samples, as long as the same construction is used for comparison) and either the frequencies of the partials or their cents deviation.

But of course, that does not mean that anyone would be able to tell the difference between one tuning and another. But in cases of a proven preference, it may give an indication what it is that is being preferred.

Jeff, both versions of the EBVT (the #2 is no longer used) yield 24 distinctly different colors for all major and minor keys, none of which sound exactly like any major or minor triad in ET. That is a fact. It is supported by Jason Kanter's graphs.

I'm not pressuring GPM, I haven't even sent him the data yet. I asked him if he would consider it and his answer was that he already had been thinking about it.

The problem with many 18th Century or earlier style temperaments on the modern piano is that while the simple keys may sound good, the remote keys may not, as you experienced with the Vallotti so, then the demand is always "Tune it BACK!" It comes from the mindset that there is one and only one arrangement that can be considered to be "in tune" and I know that most people actually think that.

However, I happen to know that there is at least a certain range of both inequality in temperament and octave stretch that most people will find acceptable. When I first constructed the EBVT, I worked within what I believed to be that range. Some comments from technicians however, pointing to cents width of the most remote key, F# major at some 19 cents, caused me to look for a way to further mitigate the idea. It was said that among the Victorian style temperaments, the EBVT was about as strong as they come, perhaps more early 19th Century style than late. Indeed, it had 5 pure 5ths while none of the other Victorian style temperaments had any pure 5ths at all.

The purpose for using a Victorian style temperament on a modern piano as opposed to an earlier style is so that virtually ANY style of music from any period can be played on it, the way that only ET is thought to be capable. It still does leave the key coloration that is expected in 17th and 18th Century music, adds intensity to 19th Century styles written in remote keys like that of Chopin, Debussy, Ravel, etc., but it also does not impose an unusual character that is not expected or desired to modern music. Instead, to Jazz, for example, it lends a crisp and incisive character to the complex harmonies. It certainly works for other 20th Century styles in the simple keys such as show tunes, pop songs, rock & role, Blues, etc.

Now, there will always be people who have another opinion. ET and only ET, anything else makes their skin crawl. I have heard it many times. Yet, if you read Karen Hudson Brown's tribute to Owen Jorgensen in the November PTG Journal, she is talking about the wonderful sound of pure thirds. You cannot have pure thirds without also having other intervals violently out of tune. The pure third that excites her sounds dull and lifeless to me.

So, we all have our opinions and are all entitled to them. I do not like ET. That is my opinion. I don't buy piano CDs and listen to them because I don't like ET. I don't go to piano concerts in ET because I don't want to hear it. I won't tune any pianos in it either, never, haven't for over 20 years.

Regardless of my personal opinion, however, I have made a great effort to help other technicians who desire and need to learn to tune ET aurally. I will continue to do that and am just as pleased when people learn from my efforts as if they had learned to tune and use the EBVT or any other style.

You are entitled to your opinion and I don't and won't deny you that but please don't try to force your opinion on me because you won't be able to.

Bill:

You posted; "You are entitled to your opinion and I don't and won't deny you that but please don't try to force your opinion on me because you won't be able to."

I have no idea what you found in my post that could possibly be seen as forcing my opinion on you.

Let's just drop it.

Ron, I knew about the player system but I had always thought it was GPM playing. To me, the fact that the player system plays everything the same is a double edged sword. On one hand, it provides for a neutrality, on the other, it does not allow the for a natural difference in expression that would be expected with different tuning styles. That difference could even occur among versions of ET with differing amounts of stretch.

I have a player system too and have some discs of Earl Wild too. When playing Chopin in the EBVT, he seems a bit heavy handed during certain passages whereas I would expect that if he were playing the same piano live, he might be inclined to "back off" a bit just because the piano itself is providing sufficient energy so as not to need the enhancement that playing louder and faster can provide.

I expect that if GPM includes the EBVT in the mix that if there are any negative comments, it will come from that. The same expression used in ET can tend to exaggerate the coloration provided by the EBVT.

Hi Bill,

I never thought about the pianist changing his interpretation due to the tuning, but that has merit. As you said, it's a double-edge sword. The one constant here will be the LX playing every piece exactly the same.

This is going to be quite an interesting project. I wish one of you guys were close by to help out. It would also be interesting to add a few more ETD's, Tunelab and Verituner come to mind. If I do that, it would take more time to finish the project. Perhaps I can find a local pro-tuner that owns a Verituner.

I won't be able to start this until mid Dec...and then the holidays...so it may be after Jan 1, that it really gets going. Looking forward to it.

That would be a great project and a great service to the ETD manufacturers and users GPM. I really hope you do it. It will be a big job.

GPM:

Count on me to help the best that I can. I do not have ETD experience, but I can slice and dice data till the cows come home.

Hi Jeff,

Thanks for the offer...will take you up on it as I progress with the project.

Byron, def a big job,.....it should be fun too!