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de-tuning a piano for performance

  • 1.  de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2014 18:05
    I am being asked to provide a piano that will sound appropriately out of tune for a particular performance in a couple weeks: "Defiant Requiem, Verdi at Terezin" It derives from a movie, etc., depicting a group of 150 Jews singing said requiem in a concentration camp (google it for more info - lots of sites).

    I can certainly do that, just kind of working at random and listening to the results, but wondered if anyone has come up with a protocol for, say, how little change will make a piano sound pretty thoroughly like a honky-tonk, from the point of view of being efficient in both directions (not needing to tune so much when putting it back). Every third unison having a string 3¢ out, every octave more or less at random having one 10 - 15¢ off, four or five notes completely haywire, that sort of thing. Seems like the something that people who work for film studios might have figured out. 

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    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    fssturm@unm.edu
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
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  • 2.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2014 18:14
    There's a tuner here in Hawaii that does this kind of tuning or a regular basis, and get's paid for it. The problem is, he doesn't know it's not supposed to sound like that. lol

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    Willem "Wim" Blees, RPT
    Mililani, HI 96789
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  • 3.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2014 18:20
    He's only used to ukalele's dude!  4 strings.  they may or may not be on any pitch of any sort. lol!  Aloha,

    "Sounds good Bruddah!" 

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    Paul T. Williams RPT
    Piano Technician
    Glenn Korff School of Music
    University of Nebraska
    Lincoln, NE 68588-0100
    pwilliams4@unl.edu

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  • 4.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-22-2014 18:15
    Fred;

    Try tuning it like the detuning stuffs as is for an RPT tuning exam.  Just nasty enough, yet keeping the proper tension on the plate.  Is that nasty enough?  or just the middle string fine and left one up and the right one down just a few cents.  Do they want it sounding like it had not been tuned for 20 years, or never.  Remember, a lot of people say, "it was tuned when we bought it!!"  LOL  Just for fun, leave A-5 just right! That'll screw them up. 

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    Paul T. Williams RPT
    Piano Technician
    Glenn Korff School of Music
    University of Nebraska
    Lincoln, NE 68588-0100
    pwilliams4@unl.edu

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  • 5.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 08:35
    Fred,
    May I respectfully suggest that you detune by paying attention to "cycle" offsets rather than "cents".  

    Once I was asked to tune the celeste bank of a Rogers church organ.  The organ's manual gave the cent offsets to do this.  The lower frequencies had far more cent offsets than higher frequencies.  This is what will give you an "even" chorus type effect everywhere in the piano.

    FWIW,
    Denis

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    Denis Ikeler
    Grand Blanc MI
    810-694-1505
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  • 6.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 10:28
    My tendency will be simply to take individual strings of a number of unisons and de-tune them by ear. The question is how many need to be done, how far apart, how widespread throughout the piano to get the effect - if you start with a piano that is in tune. So far, the answer is that I don't know.

    As it happens, the venue has a Wurlitzer studio that was last tuned a year ago - unfortunately almost exactly a year ago. So it may be "sour" enough as a starting point that all I need to do is add a few real wild ones. Or I might need to take most of the unisons and give them some width, probably left string of one, right string of the next.

    I have seen movies and TV shows where there was an out of tune piano, and figured that somebody might have worked out a method as opposed to random. But maybe not. Not a big deal. It is interesting how few bad unisons it takes to make a concert instrument sound pretty awful, but that's a different level of expectation.

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    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    fssturm@unm.edu
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
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  • 7.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 10:39
    Hi Fred,

    I've never been called on to do this.  If the piano were close to "in tune", I'd probably tune it first and then de-tune one string of each unison.  Maybe you could experiment with tuning one string out and decide one the sound you were looking for.  Then tune all of the right hand strings to that cents deviation.  I tune with RCT so that would be really easy and fast.  

    Chris

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    Christopher Purdy, RPT
    Piano Technician
    Middle Tennessee State University
    Murfreesboro, Tennessee 37132
    (740) 590-3842

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  • 8.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 10:46
    On Wednesday, April 23, 2014 09:28:18 AM Fred Sturm wrote:
    > ... As it happens, the venue has a Wurlitzer studio
    > that was last tuned a year ago - unfortunately almost
    > exactly a year ago. So it may be "sour" enough as a
    > starting point...

    Another idea (given the state of the piano there and my understanding of your
    tuning style/procedure) would be for you to tune the piano aurally, center
    strings only, leaving the outside tri-chord strings and alternate bi-chords
    where they are. If it's not 'melodious' enough at that point, you could
    'season to taste' on the un-tuned strings.
    This should leave the piano with a very definite and reliable pitch center
    throughout the scale while presenting a relatively overt and rich smorgasbord
    of other pitches & intervals depending on how much 'seasoning' you ultimately
    dumped in. :)

    Just another possibility, Fred.
    I'm sure whatever you do will nicely satisfy the requirements of the score.


    --
    Regards,

    Alan B. Crane, RPT
    School of Music
    Wichita State University
    alan.crane@wichita.edu




  • 9.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 10:54
    I was asked last year by Susan Werner to purposely de-tune one treble note and one bass note and not tell her which ones.  Of course I informed my superiors and venue managers that it was a request, not my idea.  She loved it!  Different strokes for different folks I guess.

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    Paul T. Williams RPT
    Piano Technician
    Glenn Korff School of Music
    University of Nebraska
    Lincoln, NE 68588-0100
    pwilliams4@unl.edu

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  • 10.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 11:11
    Hi Fred, some years ago I did pretty much that for Neil Young. I had no warning about the detuning request so pretty much worked with the guitar tech until he was happy. My first thought was a particularly crunchy temperament but that didn't fly as he wanted triads that were consistent and would match the guitars. So I ended up tuning as normal and then detuning one string per unison in the treble, just knocking them a beat or two flat by ear, and everyone was happy. I didn't do them all and did nothing to the bass as that anchors it all. Never had to do that again so I don't have a scheme, but that worked out at the time.


    ---Dave




  • 11.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 11:33
    I've done this for a honky-tonk sound.  I tuned the first and center unison as usual, leaving the third unison alone.  Then went back and bumped the third unison slightly flat at random.  It sounds out of tune but there is still some pitch left.

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    Robert Callaghan
    Reno NV
    775-287-2140
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  • 12.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-23-2014 14:23
    I found a YouTube performance conducted by the person who developed this (and will be coming here for the purpose). At 6 minutes the piano starts. So that gives me a kind of idea of what to do. I think all the unisons need to be "singing" for the right effect, but nothing so crazy that it will make it hard for the singers. I need to talk to our choral conductor a bit, but I get the impression the piano is only prominent in that first section, as the original performances in Terezin had only a piano, so it is evoking that, then going to full orchestra.

    This has been traveling around quite a bit, so some of you might be faced with it at some point.

    -------------------------------------------
    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    fssturm@unm.edu
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
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  • 13.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 04-24-2014 13:11
    I just got a message from the technical director (coming to town with the conductor):

    "Here are the tuning instructions we used last month in Berlin. They seemed to work fine:

    "Please tune the piano so that it has some notes slightly out-of-tune, sort of like a cabaret piano (or a prepared Ives piano). Please be sure that the "F" immediately above middle C is in tune since that pitch is used at the beginning of the Sanctus.

    "Please let me know if you have any questions. Basically, we need a piano that sounds a little off with a good F above middle C!"


    So I guess I'll just detune some unisons in the mid and high treble (if there aren't enough already <G>).

    -------------------------------------------
    Fred Sturm
    University of New Mexico
    fssturm@unm.edu
    http://fredsturm.net
    "When I smell a flower, I don't think about how it was cultivated. I like to listen to music the same way." -Federico Mompou
    -------------------------------------------








  • 14.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Posted 04-24-2014 16:11
    >So I guess I'll just detune some unisons in the mid and high treble (if there aren't enough already <G>).

    So, nothing different then... :-)

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    Regards,

    Jon Page


  • 15.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Posted 04-25-2014 08:18
    Well, I have listened to the opening bars with the out-of-tune piano and concluded that an orchestra playing so out of tune as that piano would be devastated! The individual players would hasten to find a better orchestra to play in. So just what's the point of kicking against the pricks? Every note that piano plays devastates my nurtured feelings and understanding of Musical Accompaniment. Thanks for making the Youtube available, Fred, and I sympathize with your predicament - if you need my sympathy that is. At least my wretched Porgy piano didn't impinge thoughout the Opera - but it was fun while it lasted! Michael (UK)  
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    Michael Gamble
    semi retired
    Brighton
    01273813612
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  • 16.  RE:de-tuning a piano for performance

    Posted 04-23-2014 13:27
    Willy "The Lion" Smith in a source I mentioned years ago "Music on My Mind" explains how it was common to place tin between the strings and the hammers for Honky Tonk effect, something most have found on muting felt installed with old player systems. Hence, the term, "Tin Pan Alley." Tuning effects like one pass aural pitch raises without guesstamating overpull come to mind. This of course would result in a flat range above the treble break and a disturbingly sharp range in the high treble. That might work with fairly good unisons. Or perhaps, just the effect of a piano not tuned in years, bass strings that haven't dropped much, low plain wire strings that have sunk in comparison, and high treble notes a half step flat to the piano. Well tempered, not equal tempered. Octaves expanded and contracted from equal, 6:3, 4:2, 2:1, but never precise. ------------------------------------------- Benjamin Sloane Cincinnati OH 513-257-8480 -------------------------------------------