------------------
1985 Emmons push-pull,Evans SE200,Hilton pedal, Jag Wire Strings

I think I'm in a Pithagerian Coma..

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 25 April 2005 at 07:43 PM.]

Could be worse man, you coould suffer from Syntonic Comma. Start with C and tune 4 perfect 5ths to E. Start from the same C and tune 2 octaves and a pure 3rd to E.
The two Es are not the same.

A perfect 5th is 702 cents

702+702+702+702=2808 cents

An octave is 1200 cents and a pure 3rd is 386 cents
1200+1200+386=2786 cents

2808 - 2786 = 22 cents = Syntonic Comma

And a shave and haircut is 15 dollars and 50 cents if you go to the right barber ...Nice site, but my my, the personalities are more interesting than the music at times ...James

quote:

---

So, if you tune your guitar (or piano, or bass, or any other instrument) to 440 every time, you will only be playing "IN TUNE" for one key. For most of us, that's E and C. The further you get away from that key towards the tritone (opposite the tonic on the circle of fifths) the more out of tune you'll sound.

---

WHAT????.

That came from a school?

I think I'll stick with my now secret tuning chart.

The one Bobbe and others suggested on my trip to Nashville. It works in keys that are beyond G#...

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 25 April 2005 at 08:00 PM.]

But it sounds like you're tellin me if I get my steel tuned so it don't sound like a cat with it's tail caught in the door, and if it's blending with the other instruments, instead of clashing like jet airplane, and fog horn, I might be all right?? Kinda sorta??

It is really easy to misread a post and misconstrue something. I've done it, and others have done it to me, and I've only been here a matter of months. But personal attacks demean this entire forum. Why do people do it? Because they can. What does it take to stop it? I dunno, I'm not smart enough to figure that out. But it would be good if we could. I realize it's hard to figure out exactly how a 'light-hearted' joke will be taken by someone, but if it's not obvious, perhaps it'd be better not to say it. I'd rather see us do battle on matters that matter. Those are: points about steel guitar. The other stuff is a serious distraction.

Paul Franklin made a post on the "Why So Loud" thread to the effect that volume didn't matter so much as that everyone is balanced, volume-wise. I think that relates to this thread. If everybody is clearly balanced and listening carefully to each other in a band, serious pitch problems will be obvious, and therefore correctable, unless someone has really poor pitch. But if you can't hear it, it's impossible to fix. I'd like it if I could hear everything on a bandstand as well as I hear at home or at a low-volume rehearsal. I think a lot (not all) of these problems would go away.

quote:

---

Oh and this gem from MG's last post on the first page:

quote:So, if you tune your guitar (or piano, or bass, or any other instrument) to 440 every time, you will only be playing "IN TUNE" for one key. For most of us, that's E and C. The further you get away from that key towards the tritone (opposite the tonic on the circle of fifths) the more out of tune you'll sound.

WHAT????.

That came from a school?

I think I'll stick with my now secret tuning chart.

The one Bobbe and others suggested on my trip to Nashville. It works in keys that are beyond G#...

EJL

---

Some guy named J.S. Bach... or something like that... I forget now... I've slept since then. Before Equal Tempered instruments, there were harpsichords and pianos that were different tunings, some in C, some in G, etcetera. Now being a harmonica player doesn't sound so bad, try hauling 7 pianos around to play a gig? With equal tempered tuning, one can play in all twelve diatonic keys and not sound incredibly out of tune.

Oh, and I'd like to just point out a little bit of gospel here... If the Big E does it, it must be the "RIGHT" way to do it. (P.S. that's a joke.)
http://www.buddyemmons.com/TTChart.htm

-El Garnetto Temperado

[This message was edited by Michael Garnett on 25 April 2005 at 09:07 PM.]

quote:

---

Some guy named J.S. Bach... or something like that... I forget now... I've slept since then. Before Equal Tempered instruments, there were harpsichords and pianos that were different tunings, some in C, some in G, etcetera. Now being a harmonica player doesn't sound so bad, try hauling 7 pianos around to play a gig? With equal tempered tuning, one can play in all twelve diatonic keys and not sound incredibly out of tune.

---

Well MG, here's something that'll tie a knot in your underwear..

We are calling it opposite things.

quote:

---

For the last 400 years, an ironically similar period for which slavery of another kind was in existence in Europe, the use of unequal temperament was slowly banished as the dictates of the composer demanded an irreducible unit of pitch capable of unproblematic modulation.. In the Baroque period, just before the final codification of all pitch organisation, there were well over one hundred possibilities for constructing different gradations between each pitch within twelve divisions of a scale. Tuning systems such as Meantone, Kirnberger, Silbermann, and Vallotti emphasized the different sounds of home keys, and an improvisationary modulation to a distant key was a truely exotic sonic journey.

When Bach wrote his two books of Well Tempered Clavier music, he meant 'well' not 'even' as is commonly misrepresented. In other words, every key was meant to have a distinct personality and sound; whereas today, every key in equal temperament is identical - every semitone difference between each note is identical. -Veryan Weston and Jon Rose-

---

I threw this in because I don't buy it, for one, and it was only a matter of time before some obfuscatory source would tell us that JS Bach did not indeed propose "equal temperament".

In fact, the Mesopotamians were doing it a thousand years before Bach was born.

What has been represeted as "Equal Temperament" in the last hundred pages of discussion on it here has been those that tune their instruments to where the little needle is on the little Zero on all their notes and all their changes.

Of course on a Piano the uppermost octaves go sharp a wee bit, and the lowermost intervals a wee bit flat..

Others that have these "Beatless" tuning systems have used hazy, nonspecific tunings where there are up to 30 cents difference in their "home position", and calling it Just Intonation. Evidently never realising that one or more of them is a beat off.

They seem to think that the Steel guitar is magically capable of attain True Just Intonation because of all the complex mechanisms, "compensators" renumerators, heebiejeebierators, etc, and that then because you can move this musicalmobius loop up and down the fretboard, you will be suddenly "In Tune" and all the other fretted and keyboard tuned instruments that tune to twelve equal and specific intervals are out. Bless their hearts....

Yeah, in other words TUNING TO 440. and to all 12 equally spaced intervals, as represented on digtal tuners, or tuning forks set to twelve equal tones, only deviating in the farthest reaches of the scales.

I'm not sure you feel that you need to do any further reading if you are so turned around that you don't know what's being discussed here, but Buddy Emmons' comments and explanation of how he tunes,are included on This Thread: A discussion of tuning "straight 440" or to twelve equal tonal segments as represented on tuners or forks. As opposed to tuning "non 440" or dicking around to try to get the beats out.

I don't feel like I have a lot more writing to do, and I'm not going to divulge my personal tuning method to anybody.

(I tune it till it sounds good to me using this secret method and then I play it.)

Others can do as they wish.

Beat on, or........

Bless their hearts...

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 25 April 2005 at 10:41 PM.]

I guess we'll all just have to try and survive without EJL's secret tuning method (bless his heart).

Bob C., this is all your fault!

[This message was edited by Jim Phelps on 26 April 2005 at 12:47 AM.]

I didn't know you tuned everything straight up, if I'm getting what you're saying inbetween your colorful writing.

I tuned straight up while I was playing with keyboard players, it seemed to mesh better. Of course, when practicing by yourself, it sounds awful...but the knowledge that it sounds good "out front" when blended with the band is consolation.

Also makes it a lot easier to tune in a noisy bar or club.

I remember reading a few years ago here that BE tuned straight up, seems most don't though.

It's hard for me to listen to myself when I tune straight up if I hear myself very well and not blended in, but otherwise, trying to get everything compensated perfectly is an exercise in frustration and futility.

[This message was edited by Jim Phelps on 25 April 2005 at 10:31 PM.]

I mean no harm of course, and I find what you say is true.

At home I'll flat a thing or two sometimes, but tuning "by ear" I find that I like my thirds closer to if not "straight up", from just having done it so long. As has been said, with a "wolfy" fifth added, they even out to my ear, especially at stage volume, and guitars and keybroads (that's right) I play with don't sound so "sharp".. ( hehehehe.....)

Actually on one thread I found that a lot more than will admit it do too. Probably because of the exhaustion of agrueing with "Incrimentalists"..

night...

EJL

PS: I'm listening tonight to another of those evil "straight up" tuners, Bill Stafford, on his beautiful "Going Home" CD.

[This message was edited by Eric West on 25 April 2005 at 10:45 PM.]

I think every steel player should spend an afternoon with a serious piano tuner,
and watch him go through a piano touch up, with him explaining his logic.

But not a from scratch on a out of tune piano job,
This has a whole other set of issues to confuse the steeler,
and aren't relevant.: like sectional over stretching and seasonal pre-tempering etc. A good piano tuner comes back every 3 or 4 months.

Yeah pay him for the job... well worth it.

And then test tune / retune your steel in a variety of ways relative to the pianos tunings...
yes tunings, it is more than one, depending on where you look.

And take the adivice of the piano tuner as to how to tune your steel.
Then lock this into his Peterson tuner.

Then go home and play it for awhile and see how it flys personally.

Both versus acoustic instruments, piano included, and the ubiquitous digital instruments in this life.
It might demand a note tweaking or two later, but likely not to much if at all.

Piano tuners deal with a MUCH greater set of tuning problems than any steel player.

One issue for steelers is the variety of "tempers" one must deal with.... ( yes pun intended.)
Not just the one on your instrument..

I venture that it won't be too far of what Buddy Emmons was advocating.
3rds being a bit more personalized in nature for each player and situation.

[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 25 April 2005 at 11:29 PM.]

------------------

Drew Howard - website - Fessenden D-10 8/8, Fessenden SD-12 5/5 (Ext E9), Magnatone S-8, N400's, BOSS RV-3

quote:

---

I find it comical that the guy that STARTED this crap knows the LEAST about it!!!... I just tune my E to the tuner,get the "beats" out of the open strings, get the beats out of the stops, then a bit of tweakage hither and yon as needed.... DONE!!!... If its out of tune after that, Blame the guitar guy... or the drummer,, keyboard...bass..singers.... Sousaphone... bob

---

Bob, you'd be amazed how many of the top pickers in the universe do the exact same thing. I've seen some guys tune an entire guitar (all the pulls too) with a tuning fork held up to the pickup. I only wish I could have their chops, intonation, and overall sound.

This is still the clash between two schools of thought. The "my ear tells me I'm in tune fellas", and the "guys that believe a little black or silver or blue box." Which one's right? I dunno.

Many will take exception to this, but I would rather be "out of tune together" than for one of us to be "in tune" and the other to be "out of tune".
www.genejones.com

Not only is it a difficult instrument to master technique wise, it is always either in or out of tune depending on who is listening!

Theoretically speaking of course.

Bless all your ears,

Obviously a straight bar is a deterent !

ok, my tuning technique...
I start by tuning my E's to straight up 441..then make my way worse from there...

t

PS..we may need Rodney King here on this thread..

[This message was edited by Tony Prior on 26 April 2005 at 03:30 PM.]

But I'm getting an education in this thread, just gotta keep sorting it out !!

Not that I know any of those heretics..

C is, or can be actually C# or B (Cb) with the appropriate amount of explaination.

I've certainly read enough to see how it could be looked at thataway..

EJL

So..

Does a person train their ears by playing along thousands of times with people or instruments that don't flat their thirds 15 cents and learn to instinctively flat them?

Or is the opposite true

Is it possible to train oneself to ET playing along with thousands of times of playing with instruments that tune that way?

It's a simple enough question.

(Detuning to become more in line with good intonation and meshing with differently tuned instruments that one plays with eventually reaches a point of diminishing returns. Sooner, I'd think, rather than later..)

I'd also think that "tuning" would at least have a minor role in training one's playing ear unless a person played an instrument that couldn't be tuned, like a xylophone or electronic piano. If indeed a person is going to play an instrument that must be..

I know the answers for me, and I'm happy with them at long last.

EJL

quote:

---

I somehow knew the water was getting a little warmer all the time,(I saw the guy turning up the flame) so I jumped out and hopped away.... -The Frog that walked on-

---

Imagine that someday someone invents a pedal steel or electronic device that makes the output of the steel pre-tuned, "perfect" notes, as in the same way as your electronic keyboard synthesizers and midi keyboards are pre-tuned to be in tune. You still have to hold the bar over the fret, moving the bar up or down from the fret causes the whole setup to go up or down in pitch, but all the strings are electronically pre-tuned together, along with all the pedals and knee-levers. You can program it for any tuning or pedal/kneelever setup. Got it?

OK then... what notes would the device tune the strings and stops to, to be in "perfect tune"? The same notes as a keyboard synth? If so, would it sound good or would we hear beating? Would it be the same as tuning straight-up?

[This message was edited by Jim Phelps on 26 April 2005 at 06:47 PM.]

Let me put up one of the cuts I've recorded....

just a minute...

Am I in tune?

Yes!
no...
Yes!
no...
Yes!
no.....
Yes!
no...

Darn, I knew I shouldn't have used vibrato...

------------------
www.tyack.com

quote:

---

Is it possible to train oneself to ET playing along with thousands of times of playing...

---

What's Ernest Tubb got to do with it ??!

Compensation, tempered adjustments, or elimination of "problematic" points has not been shown to work completely at this time however. Nor does it change the pitches of the instruments that play with them in today's ensembles.

The machine would also have to have an aparatus to keep other instruments from playing notes that were not in the beatless scale being used unless they were beatless instruments too. Maybe with electric shocks delivered to the other musicians that played them.

THEN the machine would have to automatically intone all single notes as to their substitution value within the chord usage in the "song". And in scales up and down the neck.

I'd think that a better bet would be a machine that kept all notes within 5 cents of their ET value, on all strings, changes, and with fretboards that were layed out strictly logarithmically. (sp)

I have one.

It would take a few years' time to learn to play them that way, or learn to expect to hear them that way, but less time than trying to match a 30cent deficit in a "tuning scheme", learning the omission patterns in linear scales or substitutions, or building a machine that would do all the above mentioned.

They can make a machine for just about anything though..

EJL

I'm not suggesting someone should build one and that it would cure the tuning issue, just curious about the hypothetical question of if it were possible, what notes would it be tuned to, and how it would sound.

[This message was edited by Jim Phelps on 26 April 2005 at 09:14 PM.]