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quote:

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Steel players do it without fretting

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http://www.waikiki-islanders.com

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wait until somebody comes over & tells ya' you're out of it

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Then the thing to do is show them how your tuner says that you are in tune and print out a copy of this thread for them to read.

Then look for a day job.

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Bob
intonation help

I've tuned ET from the first time I saw a Conn Strobo-tuner, but I've tried to tune to the Newman chart a few times in the past. I just couldnt hang with it. Too many things bugged me about it. I've also tried to use my ear, which I've always thought was pretty good, to adjust my 3rds etc., but I found that I'd get so far off eventually that I just went back to 440 straight across before I went nuts.

I know the frustration..but remember I have been there before. Playing all my life presented many obstacles that I was able to overcome. During my Godfrey performance I accidently dropped the bar during Caravan.

After the show Godfrey said..wow that was great,leave that in.To which I replied It was an accident Mr.Godfrey and Godfrey said fine..Have more accidents. bOb did I sound out of tune to your ear?
Let me know,Im getting a complex...btw the story above regarding my dropping the bar during my CBS show was documented and wrote up in the program by Dewitt Scott.

Check it out if you have a program. Thanks.

I have thick skin and have been around a few years.Being a Fender rep in the early days was an education. Although it hurt Fender salesman back then got used to being rejected
so you see, other than the frustration in St.Louis I know something was wrong.My guitar
WAS tuned to A 440 all the way. edited to add and this is not an excuse..I knew my wife was dying as we were in St.Louis...add that to playing without a talkover or rehearsal of some kind and then Im playing to my peers...It was dificult and when I found that my guitar was out of tune,I played softly to try to get the most out of it and when Bobby Caldwell took his chorus I tried desperatly to get back on the beam. At that point I was sinking deeper into the sand

I have a copy of my performance and its not all that bad but I know dammed well that if I didnt have the pressure of knowing my wife was seeing me play for the last time,I may have not played as poorly as I did.

The band was great but the high volume was distracting me as I tried to play "I'll Never Smile Again". As told to me by a fellow steel player after the show who is a member of the SGHOF..his comments were...you should have done as Johnny Farina did and take over and let the band follow you my friend.

Johnny advised me before the show that the previous year he felt he played poorly but he said that this year he asked for a talk over and a rehearsal..You may have noticed Johnny leading the band into his tempo's.

That is a GREAT band and I have the utmost respect for each and every one but a talk over would have been nice. Especially someone being inducted. No sour grapes here my friend, I am proud to be among those greats on the wall in St.Louis and proud that the Committee that honored me.

Thank you

[This message was edited by Jody Carver on 13 January 2005 at 05:20 PM.]

Db

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"Promat"
~when tone matters~

Changes? If I don't have a tuner, I do it much the same way using of course the Thirds and Fifths as they appear with pedals down, and knee levers pulled. I don't remember having to do it except for a string guage change.

If I want to do it fast, I don't count the beats as much and just go for what is in my memory until I can get tuned by a correct tuner. The G#s get a "sparkle" and the F#s match the Bs with the Eb inbetween.

I just tried it while I posted, and I got within 7 cents on the worst of it.

If you tune a pedal steel guitar "by ear" so the "beats" are "gone", then you're going to be at least fifteen cents out of tune with an electic piano, (or an acoustic one tuned by a competent professional) well intoned guitar, or any other fixed pitch instrument like a bass, violin that uses any open strings, glockenspiel, vibes, etc etc ad naus..

If that's tuning "by ear", then somebody's "ears" are taking them to La La Land.

From all the different reasons not to be in tune that I've heard, they mostly deserve to be there, or they're probably in bands that can't tell.

Hell, most of them I've heard really don't care anyhow. I enjoy the ones that don't sometimes the most. I'm not as critical of others and their bands as I am of myself and mine. I'm easily entertained.

I don't mean to be insulting here, but if reading this many words has confused you then you'd never be able to read this well Posted and Read ( by some of us anyhow) Page on the Stroboscope Site. So give up, direct a couple snide remarks my way and continue to turn your knobs until you can't hear those pesky little throbbing noises. We'll all be happier.

If you don't tune straight up, this post doesn't really apply to you if you aren't going to behave. That's my take on it.

Again, the post is titled "Anybody else tune straight up 440?". It wasn't in some foreign language.

Not: "Anybody feel like venting their personal and intellectual frustrations on people that have chosen a method of tuning and playing in tune that is similar to the instruments they play with.?"

Here's a Great Line for those that can't get that far on the page:

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Of course, a student with patience and perseverance can learn to tune a piano properly using a single pitch reference and their ears. It is said this is a skill that can take years to develop. -PST-

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I'm going to go way out on my limb here and say that if you don't have the patience and perserverence to learn to tune your instrument without resorting to "turning the knobs till the throbbing stops", then by all means don't. Save yourself the trouble.

Also save yourself the trouble of telling me that it is the correct way to tune with fixed pitch instruments that you play with. No matter how you slice it, it ain't.

Can you 'get away with it'? Godspeed.

Can Billy Sherrill tell? I could care less.

Do famous Nashville players tune that way?

More power to 'em. I know of one that doesn't..

"It is said that this can take years to develop."

This post is from the son of a piano tuner, that's tuned to tuning forks, pitch pipes, correctly, tuned pianos or the top of the line electronic tuners, for 40 years. Pedal Steel steadily with fixed pitch instruments for the last 26 of those years. Somewhere along the line, I learned the difference. (Dad first showed me on the pianos he tuned with the "Fischer Method" in 1959.)

Turn the little knobs until the throbbing stops, if that's what you want to do. It'll keep your head from hurting.

Just don't try to tell me and at least 20 others that answered this post correctly that it's something that it's not.

It's not "Simple", because you have too may loose ends in your 5 positions per fret on a 3x4 E9.

It's not "Correct", because you are 15 or more cents off with other fixed pitch instruments. Single notes especially.

It's really not "Easy" unless you have given up on playing in tune with fixed pitch instruments like piano guitar etc etc.

The only thing that is "Easy" for you is trying to plant seeds of doubt in those that are not sure why they tune the way they tune if they tune "straight up".

With me it just doesn't work for the reasons I mentioned before you got a headache.

Just turn the little knobs till the throbbing stops.

You'll feel better.

So will I.

EJL

Go ahead Mr Doggett. Throw another orchestra at me. (Hold off on the Natural World however because somewhere in it is a professionally tuned Steinway..)

I can catch it, juggle a dozen eggs, and continue looking for my musical review in the NYT. All while skating down a razorblade whistling "The Music of the Night".

In E. T.

All others mistakenly taking offense, here's yet another way to look at it:

Saying that the twelve note system is the basis for the music you are playing is your first admission. Twelve Keys, C C# D Eb E F F# G G# A Bb and B. Did I miss one?

Secondly you are stating that you are tuning notes you use as "thirds" "sixths" and others, so many cents "flat" to the notes in it.

There's your final admission.

At least that one guy admitted that he used a 43 note scale. Boy, that'd be some set of sharps and flats to remember. I LOVED the machine he invented to play it. It looked like the inderside of one of those "compensated Emmonses".

Then..

Some of the more high minded say that there "really is no scale", and that it's all one big Just Intonation Chord. As if they DARE the planetary harmony to change as planets gradually spin closer to the Sun and change the number of "beats" in the Planetary Chord. (They probably had a canniption fit when Schumaker-Levy hit Jupiter.)

That's fine, and of course how I view it from a totally detached perspective, which I attain after reading or listening to an hour or more of discourses wherin "black is really another shade of "white", or "up is just another way of looking at "down".

Somewhere I glance at the old Sho~Bud, and see that the strings are divided up into twelve neat sections per octave. Probably as close mathematically as Shot and Buddy could figure them.

Then I know that all my strings are tuned as close to those twelve sections as I can get them, as are all my changers.

I think of how hard it has been to learn how to play them the same way. Especially with "cabinet drop".

Especially this last hour after working construction all day, and typing another 5000 word essay on twelve equal sections.

It makes me tired.

Soon, I'll be going to sleep. I'll sleep well.

When I wake up tomorrow, God willing, I'll feel the same way about it.

When I play the next gig, I'll try my best to "play in tune".

I have faith when the thirteenth note is discovered, that I'll be able to adapt.

Until then,

Twelve has been enough of a job.

Lets see.. A has three sharps, five semi demi flats, and six hemi demi sharps unless used as the major the two of the new five of the new one chord.. Then.....

Keep screwing around and it's going to become a Pentatonic Scale... Where Fiddlers rule.

You won't like that at all..

I know I won't.

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 13 January 2005 at 10:38 PM.]

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Zum D10 /8x5 / session 500rd
steelin for my Lord

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http://www.johnmcgann.com
Info for musicians, transcribers, technique tips and fun stuff. Joaquin Murphey transcription book, Rhythm Tuneup DVD and more...

IMO - tuning beatless leaves too many unverified assumptions. I know my guitars don't get perfectly pure overtones, because half the time I hear beatless at two different but very close string tension settings. So either my ear is whacked, or the strings provide a relatively narrow statistical distribution of frequencies that we refer to collectively as "pitch".

Also, I would certainly not equate tuning 'beatless' as "tuning by ear". The former is a purely technical exercise that can be done silently with an oscilloscope if needed, or perhaps by a trained monkey with no musical experience whatsoever.

The concept of 'tuning by ear' requires a more sophisticated musical approach - like when you strike all 10 or 12 strings on your guitar and complete the tuning while a bunch of dissonant open strings are still jangling away. Tune it till it sounds right.

That is an extremely "beatful" way of tuning and I would consider this approach closer to "tuning by ear". I often find this a more satisfactory method than tuning beatless because you can take advantage of multiple intervals and not just the interval between two imperfect strings.

I've never had the opportunity to test if I am closer to ET or JI when I tune THAT way...

The flipside of perfect mathematical symmetry is that it may be a musical disadvantage. Why should the scale neccesarily be a perfect transposition of itself as you move up in frequency?...It could limit the nuances of timbre that are available from less-symmetrical tuning methods. Composers like Mozart probably could only truly stand to hear thier work if it was only played in the key AND tuning it was intended. Subtle to most of us - but understandably profound to musical geniuses.

Overall, I'm a bit ambivalent but the discussion is sure interesting. Tuning is the most fundamental aspect of music, and therefore it is destined to be an interesting topic. Not unlike religion or politics!

[This message was edited by Tom Gorr on 14 January 2005 at 05:56 PM.]

Maybe you should go out and play a couple hundred sober steel gigs, and come back give me some intelligent correction.

I gave you at least twelve hours to come up with something intelligent to say. Your time's up. No other rats showed up.

I at least thought I'd be called to account by Johhny Cox, or Bruce Bouten..

Even Bob Hoffnar has pretty much left me to my pathetic nobodiness, and that really stings....

To answer the original post:

I do.

Did I mention why?

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 14 January 2005 at 06:49 PM.]

Then it's "the guitar" or the "piano" that's "out of tune". That's usually the desired end.

And that years of learning to expect and play Equal Tempermant has just been a "bad habit" that will separate you from "better musicians".

Be careful, because then when you've tired of the complexity, and give in to "their system" and you still like to hear ET, you'll be SOL. You'll have sawed off your own limb.

Keep in mind that if you are uncompromising, you'll find major flaws in each and every one of the "systems". They will find none in yours unless you give up.

They might opt for personal attacks or ridicule, but considering the caliber of people that do it, it's relatively easy to live through.

I myself won't give up and ignore the whole 1+1= "whatever", until a few more search engine hits turn up on "tuning a pedal steel guitar" that don't fill a new searching player's mind full of obfuscatory nuance.

It's the least I can do. I'm glad I didn't get sucked into it.

>And I'm tired of this thread.

"my pathetic nobodiness"---That's YOUR quote, sir. Perhaps Mssrs. Bouton, Cox, whoever, have gotten just as tired of this thread as have the rest of us.
Or maybe it's just you.

[This message was edited by Stephen Gambrell on 14 January 2005 at 10:24 PM.]

You've pretty much covered "Me".

Thanks.

I'm sure Johnny Cox, and Mr Bouten can speak for themselves. Bob H is on a national tour I'm sure, and b0b has probably overdosed..

Maybe they're just busy, or decided that since they don't tune straight that just posting that they didn't was enough.

You're right though, I'm sure they like you better..

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 14 January 2005 at 11:51 PM.]

The owner of the company came up at a local get together and told me that Mr E "Endorsed Them". I allowed as how Mr. Emmons could play a shovel with strings on it better than somebody like me with the fanciest guitar. My ProIII was 6 years old and still had the lacquer on it. I was still using the case as a seat.

Mr Charleton's comments to me personally of them being a "Cadillac without a motor" in late 1981 or so changed to an endorsement shortly after Mr E's. I haven't talked to him since, though not for that, or any other reason.

I didn't do any "web research", but I think Mr Lashley had invented a way to alienate Buddy, business or otherwise and I hear tell it worked.

If it was a "compensator", I noted Mr Emmons comments to be

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Compensation is what I had to deal with tuning the old way but now it’s a thing of the past.

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That's with my personal recollection of things, from what happened to me here, so it's subject to correction.

Or my being shot I guess.

How'd I do?

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 15 January 2005 at 12:08 AM.]

I wish you'd quit getting so "personal". It's kind of annoying.

Unless I'm reading Mr Emmons comments wrong, he doesn't use "compensators" to tune or to play straight up, and it what he 'used to deal with'. I beg correction. Maybe he does use some form of them, but from my reading it'd be for 'cabinet drop', and not "Just Intonation".

I don't know if his JCH, The Blade, the MCI or whatever it was that he sol....nevermind... or the Sierra he has strung as a C6 has them.

Don't go away on my account.

As far as these tuning threads "never having any conclusion", I beg to differ.

They all do.

There are a lot of "people" that never seem to have any.

I'm not one of them.

I can certainly change them, and I have before.

But on this subject you can bet I won't.

Good Luck in drawing yours.

No hurry.

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 15 January 2005 at 12:17 AM.]

And, I think, unfairly perplexing to serious students learning to play.

You're so right about the "bedroom ears".

I'll bet too, like me, that just because you hear "it" or "them" being out of tune, you still enjoy and respect "their" playing. It's just when they try to call it something that it's not.

It all comes undone when the guitar player says "play me your E's on that C neck", and you tell him why they're so out of tune with his guitar, and both your tuners...

Glad you showed up.

I was getting shot up pretty bad..

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Once in a while I'd catch some little "nuance" of an Emmons Instrumental that was "wrong"

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Pretty nervy, Eric. Care to extrapolate on that?

You're the one standing in front of the stage, by the steel guitarist, arms crossed, brow furrowed.

Drew

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Gazornktron T-16 w/ FranistatSUX2000 mod

Mr Charleton's learning and worship of Buddy Emmons' Instrumentals was second to none. I'm sure it still is. It was all done without "turning the speed down", and nobody could fault him for getting a couple passages "nuanced"..

There were a couple notes in the walkdown to Earl's Breakdown, a couple differences in Four Wheel Drive on the last I IV I VI II V I that I got after listening to the records.

Believe me I'm sure Mr C would have said " Oh", and we'd have "done it that way".

It was all I could do to learn the simplest of things, even practicing 8+hours a day, while my fellow airmen kept our country safe with me shucking my duties while I did.

On "Almost to Tulsa" after he started putting the D on top of the C6, Mr C changed the two string (1st and 2nd) sliding fret one to fret three, and using the bar to raise the 1st string.( This since he slacked the pedal 5 change after he adopted the D on top.) Since it was his song, I felt like he was showing me something special indeed.

However, knowing the holes in my playing, and remembering the times I was, though most kindly, "chastized", I didn't feel like hitch hiking up the Beltway to the Base with my guts hanging out. I did it in tears a couple times. I was just a 25 year old kid after all..

It wasn't Mr C, as much as it was Me.

If you want to know the naked truth, I think Buddy, as he was in the first period of his teaching, had some "patience issues", and I wasn't going to do any more than I did at that time to aggravate them or him. As far as a teacher, as well as a player, I give him the "Number One" slot with no qualms whatsoever, now OR then. All things considered, and looking back, he was more patient with me than I was.

I learned what it was to be "serious" and "demanding of one's self". I also saw that "being right" is not the primary precursor of doing something with dedication and heart.

Deliberation has it's place, but only helps if it makes one's actions Deliberate..

I've got a feeling that something's rustling under the leaves here..

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 15 January 2005 at 11:37 AM.]

Hook

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