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Bill Bremmer has written,

"Tuning the various Types of Octaves

Now, to achieve the optimum compromise between a 4:2 and 6:3 octave, sharpen the A3 very slightly so that neither check for a 6:3 or a 4:2 octave tests perfectly. In other words, the test for a 4:2 octave should reveal a slightly faster F3-A4 M10 than F3-A3 M3 and the test for a 6:3 octave should reveal a slightly slower C4-A4 M6 than A3-C4 m3. When you have found the spot for A3 which reveals this slight discrepancy between the 4:2 and 6:3 tests, you will hear that the A3-A4 octave has a very slow beat to it, about one beat in every two seconds. This is now considered the optimum width for the initial A3-A4 octave in Equal Temperament and what is used by
most CTE’s to set up the Master Tuning for the Tuning Exam.

It is also the equivalent to within a very small and negligible degree of a 4:2 octave plus one cent. This is the width of octave that Dr. Al Sanderson used to obtain the amount of stretch needed for optimal piano tuning when he created the calculation for his Electronic Tuning Device, the Sanderson Accu-Tuner. In this kind of compromise, note that none of the coincident partials are in tune or match exactly with each other. This may also be an example of the whole octave sound of which Virgil Smith often speaks. This, almost but not quite perfect tuning, is an example of the kind of compromise which is necessary to defeat the problem and challenge of inharmonicity, the way to achieve the finest tuning possible from the modern piano, throughout its entire range."

Now clearly a 4:2+ octave has a slight/slow beat to it. Either the 4:2+ octave has a beat or it does not have a beat, it is either beatless or it is beating, however slowly. In other words, it sounds or does not sound beatless!

I am saying that the 4:2+ octave does not sound beatless and that one definitely hear a slight swell/beat in it. Basically, it sounds like a slightly narrowed/tempered P5.

So that is why I am saying that it is the 4:2 octave which actually is the beatless octave in the middle of the piano. Please take note that I am not speaking about the so-called "optimal place of the octave", though surely this too is a moot point amongst tuners.

Mark you wrote,

"It needs to be repeated that, if one was to tune an octave to sound as clean and clear as possible, concentrating on eliminating the higher partial noise, and then analyse its size, one would find the octave to be a wide 4:2 and a narrow 6:3. Try it. It "sounds" beatless but we know that there are beats at all the partials. Why and how does it "sound" beatless? Cancelling is the only explanation I can come up with. But an explanation is not really needed, only the experience of hearing it and analysing it and coming to that conclusion, re:size and quality."

M3=M10, 4;2 octave is a just octave,therefore beatless and clean. The M3<M10, 4:2+ is wide, meaning not just/is beating/and is unnatural stretch?

Surely, an interval is just or tempered, and from what I understand, just is just and tempered is tempered/beating. If the F3-F4 octave is just, a 4:2, then it is not beating. But if it is tempered to a 4:2+, it is now beating and sounds like it too.

An explanation is necessary and the hearing of it,otherwise the proof would not be in the eating of the pudding?

I'll send a video. Wish me luck. But even with a video, if you are focusing your hearing on the partials, you will hear a slow beat. You should be listening to the "whole octave sound" as Virgil Smith encouraged, listening more like a musician, less like a piano technician. Maybe it is an aural illusion, but one that I definitely hear and use to tune octaves, without the need to use checks.

Cheers,

Mark, I tune whole tone. I have Virgils book too. I also do have a DVD by Jim Coleman tuning the Baldassin/Sanderson Temprament, not only does he speak about a slight swell in the A3-A4 octave and A2-A4 double octave, one actually hears it, when playing and listening in whole tone.

A 4:2+ octave was tuned for the A3-A4 octave and a 6:3+ (if i remember correctly) octave for the A3-A2 octave, thereby producing a 4:1+ (a wide not just) double octave.

So I have actually heard it, apart from reading about and I have tuned it too.

For a 4:2+ octave the 5th needs to beat slightly slower than the 4th, thus producing a slightly wide and beating octave.

For a 4:2 just octave, the 5th and 4th will be beating the same, thus producing a clean sounding octave.

It's simple, that is just how it is, nothing fancy.

Another thing, since you brought it up, to tune octaves without using checks is not advisable. I would think that it would not produce as good a tuning as is possible.

A technique which Virgil wrote about is, " The amount of expansion and contraction of each interval necessaery to achieve a quality equal tempered tuning (I would go so far as to say all tuning, whether E.T or H.T), can only be determined by use of tuning checks. Checks are used before the note is tuned to determine if the note is sharp or flat and by how much,during the tuning, and after it is tuned to check the accuracy of the tuning."

Thanks,

Bill Bremmer says the following, "When you have found the spot for A3 which reveals this slight discrepancy between the 4:2 and 6:3 tests, you will hear that the A3-A4 octave has a very slow beat to it, about one beat in every two seconds."

Bill is speaking about a 4:2+ octave.

The 4:2 6:3 test is deceptive, and it does not help the ear to perceive a nice octave plus differences in iH nd spectra make it just an approximate rule for beginners, not something we can refer constantly.

To me the whole partial match method gave the problem of being disrupted by the unison tuning, where the second or 3d partials are more or less emphases, and then I will would not bet on the similarity of their justness with the one measured on a single string.

Ok, Isaac, please explain, how one perceives a nice octave?

The problem I find with some tuners is that they like to couch everything in the Esoteric and subjective, and leave behind the objective. Usually you will find such folks making claims of superior tuning. Yes, there is room for movement in an octave or any other interval, but at the end of the day, one has to have something that you measure by for accurate tuning.

Please also do explain how you go about tuning. It surely would be useful and helpful to many!

Thank you

Hi ,it depends of the acoustics of the room and the voicing, I was confident with that "measuring" method till Inoticed that the 6:3 can be used as an extreme limit eventually, but I stopped totally to test min third and min tenth, even M3 and M10, those comparaisons between diffenet intervals are not precise, the beatings are uneven, due to fluctuations of the beat volume they look as if they accelereate then slow.enventually the 10th 17th gives some information, I talk of tuning by ear indeed.

I was also stated that the iH is too impredicteable, may vary from string to string, may depend of the force of the stroke, so basing the tuning only on iH is at last dangerous.

I dont pretend to any superior result I just dont need those tests now.

In the end of course a concert tuner that need to tune so much pianos a day can also use and ETD and provide accepteable "secure" results, and have a good wallet at the end of the day.

All situations arise, from the technician who spend a full week on a grand Bechstein to voice and regulate the piano to the customer desire, (new hammers installed and keys balanced at the shop prior to that), to the one that spend 1 or 2 day on a previously "restored" grand only to have a more pleasing piano, or the "usual" "tuner's day" where the customer have only a moderate fee to pay for a finally relatively fast done job. (sometime as fast as less than an hour)

Tuning is very important if the tuner is not experimented yet, but once you are mastering tuning and pin setting, the next level(s) of quality are obtained with very differnt things than absolutely perfect progression of intervals, high consanance and nice open unisons, in fact to make that nice tuning many things are in order that will make it easy and more fast.

you take the piano possibilities (that are often hidden below a basic regulation) , and allow the piano to have them expressed.

Not trying to hide voicing problems with regulation or the opposite is just the trap of that job.






Ev

Well Isaac, Virgil used checks and I would say that Rick Baldassin used checks, and many other top notch tuners, simply from observing all the information about checks.

Ok, one can check one's work with SBI's or RBI's and there may be other ways to gauge one's work but nevertheless, checking is essential.

But still you have not been clear in how to tune octaves, double octaves, 12ths, 19ths etc... without checking. How does one know when each interval is where it should be?

Let's leave the regulation and voicing out. It is not necessary for what we are talking about.

Thanks,

sorry but I dont know, I want a progression of FBI, nice sounding SBI, I never check for octaves doubles and triples again, I hear if they need to be enlarged, at some point in the tuning, sometime I rewind and go back to octave 5 or the break, but I hear the tone in my mind, sorry. I can even tune a piano while listening to music (up to some point) this is incrusted in my ear, due to a lot of tuning, with differnt methods.
comparing diffent intervals is tiring, I try to stay quiet while tuning.
If I where doing much more concert tunings, the stress of the situation certainly would push me to use more checks.


PS One thing I check when in the 5th and 6th octave is the speed of 17ths and 24 ths.., generally speaking I refer to the middle of the piano and temperament zone .., for the rest , I play many usual intervals inside the octave for each new note

Thanks Isaac for chiming in. Atleast you admit to the necessity
of checks in concert work.

Regards,

What people need to keep in mind is that a beatless octave is almost always something theoretical and is not something that is practiced in reality. There are limits to what tuners can hear - can you hear the difference between an octave beating .2 or .3 per second? What about .02 or .03 times a second? On the PTG tuning exam I can tell you that "pure sounding unisons" when measured are often .2 or .3 cents apart.

Slightly false tones in strings, and slight difference between strings give pianos a complex tone when all unisons are open that defies any attempts at pure beatlessness.

I do not use temperament strips when I tune. I tune unisons as I go. So I think more in terms of "sweet spots" than absolute beat rates. To me, smoothly progressing 6th, 10th, and 17ths that are lively but not too edgy (I know, that's subjective - but that's the art of tuning!) I find the fast beating intervals are the fine sandpaper of a good tuning, and have the largest impact on the musical quality of the piano.

With open strings, octaves are often too nebulous/complex to be a very accurate gauge, because most octaves will be made up of 6 strings. With a temperament strip you can be deceived into thinking you are being more accurate than you really are.

I have found that the perfect tuning continues to be elusive. As my skills have progressed, my ears just get pickier and pickier, so I am still not completely satisfied, and I doubt I ever will be.

Listening to the "whole tone" I believe is a gimmicky way of saying you're not paying as close attention. When you step away from an oil painting you don't see the brush strokes, does that mean the painting itself is more prefect?

Hi all,

there's also another thing to consider. If you tune a full length, high-quality instrument like a Fazioli 278 or a Steinway D, in some octaves there is only a negligible difference between the 2:1/4:2/6:3 octave. At least as I hear it, and as far as the checks tell. On the other hand, on a short instrument with less than ideal scaling, not only will there be a huge difference between these octave sizes - sometimes they won´t even line up like they should.

Just something I think is worth remembering. Bill's suggestion requires a piano with "good enough" length and scaling.

What a tuner can hear is the progressiveness of fast beating intervals, , and that without being too much attentive.

The problem with tuning with unisons as you go is that every new tuned note lower the precedent, so the tuner is working in a sort of light pitch raising mode, he also use the unison to correct the pitch if necessary.

That last point is similar to when strip muting, at the difference that when strip mutiing, the lowering is more predictible, in my opinion, and the sensation of security is better.

Hopefully unisons allow to push the pitch high or to lower it, that is how I understand that anyway.

I's my understanding that Bill Bremmer uses this description of the A3-A4 octave to allow for the different beat rates that the octaves will divide into. I believe he's warning against narrowing or overly widening the octave to accommodate specific beat rates as the octave is divided.

But I've been wrong before. It might be best to ask Bill himself.

Hence a high iH instrument will be voiced with little power at FFF so to have the benefit of that enlarging of the spectra at moderate and light play.
Fazioli are in the low iH range, hence the straightening of the tone, sound a bit "clinical" to me by the absence of defects in iH.
And then, no way to enlarge / push the spectra, it sound unnatural very soon and FBI are really too fast then.

My guess generally speaking is that IH helps for tone projection, then a Fazioli would be more adapted to recordings or smaller spaces...

I yanked this graph off the web:



If we consider the red line as the apparent beat(s)speed between two notes an octave apart as one is moved from flat to sharp, there's that little range in the middle where the octave is "best". That, I believe, is what Virgil talked about when tuning via a "whole sound" approach. No checks, just movement across the zone to determine the best placement.

Some octaves have a much steeper graph, some wider - which respond to those octaves that are easy to tune, while some sit on a knife edge for finding just the right place. And then there are some octaves which never seem to get "still", no matter where you move the string! But by tuning with movement across the center line, it is easier to find the center "zone" than by nudging bit by bit closer and then trying to test if you ended up in the "right place".

Be careful of applying methods developed on larger, or better scaled instruments for general use. (for example, realize that by the time Virgil was writing his book, he had mostly limited his tuning to Steinway grands...)

Ron Koval

Steinways have a moderate but normal iH, similar to Yamaha.

This allow for some variations in octave size, some can be covered by the enlarging of the temperament or some can be reserved to the extreme of the keyboard.

Fazioli can only be tuned "straight" and "pure" no enlarging of octave is really allowed because of low iH the spectra is concentrated, there is no space to allow pushing toware 6:3 for instance.

Some pianos have a huge iH, and the tuner have a tendency to enlarge the octave a lot, while it is not always necessary, but too small octaves sound nasal on those pianos.

With high iH, "tempered" intervals are beating slowly, Fast beating intervals are slower, the tone grasp the ear easily, but dynamics is reduced noticeably.

Older pianos with old wire have a raise in iH, hence their need for soft hammers. Then as the soundboard also does not provide a large dynamic plage the success of refelted and soft pressed hammers on old pianos is explaned.

New hammers will then be voiced so to have mostly fundamental and a little second partial, the top of the spectra stay limited and is out of focus.

Some musicians or pianists notice that the pitch is changing between the attack and the sustain. I dont really know how the tuner use that effect while tuning but it is certainly a part of the mix.

There is something that limits the precision of the perception for beats.

As the tone diseappear following a slow curve it sort of make the beginning of a slow beat, it can be as one beat every 3 or 5 seconds. So any beat caused by frequency shifts can hide in that without being noticed.

Then coupling can be obtained at a partial level, while making a frequency shift for the fundamental, that is why I believe it is important to tune the beginning of the tone and the rest. The energy level immediately after the attack is probably telling me that I am in phase at the fundamental level, then coupling the partials is worked later, during the sustain, as a differnt part of tone, that is how I perceive the tone anyway.

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Ryan, yes, as you say there is this imperceptible measurement. This is reality, as is the reality of pure/just sounding intervals too. As you ask, can one hear the difference between an octave beating .2 or .3 bps? In other words, tuning an octave beating at .2bps, sounds pure/just/clean?



Agreed, to a certain degree. As someone once said (I think it may have been Newton Hunt), the SBI's are the stretch indicators, and the RBI's are the incremental smoothers.

The other thing is this, as one checks one's work/tuning as it develops and progesses, with all the available checks, SBI's and RBI's, then one is tuning objectively and one is in a position to make the subjective and subtle changes (the art of tuning)that are necessary.



Ryan, if Virgil Smith's whole tone tuning was gimmicky, how did he become to be known as a renowned piano tuner? Was not his tuning accurate and high end? Was it just gimmicky?

Secondly, when listening to 3rds, 6ths, 10ths, 17ths, 8ves, D8ves, 12ths, 19ths etc...is one not listening to whole tone intervals?

The important thing is to check your work as you progress through the tuning, so that one has the wood and the trees in view, not missing anything, as much as is possible to the fallible human mind.

So, as I have been saying, one need's to listen to the whole tone SBI's and listen to the whole tone RBI's to make sure one's work is as accurate as possible, whether it be for E.T or H.T.

Apart from speaking about clean/pure/just octaves and double octaves etc... one must not forget that this is only one way of tuning the piano. Another thing, for concert work in bigger halls one will need to stretch more and accordingly.