At the weekend I was tuning for a very much looked-forward-to concert. The instrument was nice, to say the least, and whilst tuning unequal temperament nothing I do should cause any problem with an instrument. It was a Bosendorfer Imperial. Having come across a very helpful discussion about tuning to 444 or 443 in which someone had most helpfully included the scaling graph
http://18019014610044144640.googlegroups.com/attach/abe43c57796888e3/bosendorfer.jpg?part=0.1
what presented to me as replaced and odd strings on 1, 2, 8, and 9 if not others looking in detail, should have been warning to me not to touch any in the region. I simply should not have touched them.
What a surprise it was that number 6 was to be next, and I was to be the one with the short straw who copped it. :-)
In the morning I tuned - it was at 440.5 and for safety and standardisation I took it down to 440. All was well. The concert showcasing the relevance of tuning, I returned in the afternoon and with a rise in temperature the pitch had fallen to 439.5 and, exactitude of tuning being rather paramount for this concert, I went through and tweaked some notes. Having had no problems in the morning and gone down in pitch the loss of string 6 was a surprise.
At least I survived strings 14 to 18 at higher tensions although the strings were giving me an uncomfortable feeling on the lever and I was guarded in my movements as a result. Bicords at least don't cause loss of a playable note . . .
I use a very accurate machine, unknown in the USA, the CTS5, very deliberately to give exact standardisation to what I do from tuning to tuning, and to minimise unnecessary movement of strings. I'd tested the bottom two strings traditionally aurally finding the 3rd harmonic node at arms length down the string, checking the perfect 12th and checking that the nodal note matched what my machine was telling me listening to the 3rd harmonic. This meant that as I went up I was exercising maximum care and not moving unnecessarily. However, with the mismatched strings tonality was changing going from old to new to old requiring an aural best match of harmonics and this might have caused either me or previous tuners to hunt slightly in this region for the best match and progression giving more metal fatigue on the entry to the coil.
No doubt all of us look back at things we might have done and where better judgement would have told us to stay away. I shouldn't have touched those strings.
On the other hand, on a concert piano, it's rather a surprise and a disappointment that others curating this instrument had allowed it to continue with mismatched strings visibly and audibly different putting on what might be expedient to install in a hurry rather than installing a new set.
String 0 appeared to be thinner than string 1 and without measuring I wouldn't like to testify to the absence of other gauge irregularities.
Very vexing, and to the instrument's owner I've had to eat humble pie and take whatever remediation might be deemed appropriate on the nose. As the instrument was to be tuned the next day for another concert by its regular tuner, simply sending off the string perhaps to Gregor Heller and fitting a new one in the weeks necessary wasn't an option. Luckily bottom Bb isn't a note which most concerts require.
Best wishes
David P
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David Pinnegar BSc ARCS
Hammerwood Park, East Grinstead, Sussex, UK
+44 1342 850594
"High Definition" Tuning
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