Help! How do I break up with my tuner?

ShiroKuro · 2024-08-26T00:40:14+00:00

Some of you might remember that I wasn’t happy with my previous tuner (the guy who likes unequal tunings and left me with a shimmery tuning). He’s a super ni...

Bellyman

Sophia I guess nowadays they have all kinds of electronic doodas to help them tune, but in the olden days, they arrived with nothing but a tuning fork and their own ability to hear perfect pitch. If you got a tuner who didn't have it, you had to listen to that "just not entirely right" tuning for the next six months... so I know exactly what you have been saying in this thread,

Don't judge a tuner by the equipment they use to tune your piano. Judge the piano tuner by the tuning they leave on your piano. Skills cover a very large range, from very good to very poor, in both aural and electronic tuners. Many use elements of each. For instance, few use an actual tuning fork anymore because it fluctuates pretty radically depending mostly upon temperature which means it may not be all that accurate. Electronic pitch detection devices are super accurate in comparison. The actual "doodas" a tuner may use are his tools. He may have good tools or poor quality tools. He may have the skills to use his "doodas" to an extremely high level or he may not have those skills. He may be able to tune 100% by ear. He may choose to tune much of the piano by means of inputing useful data into a "dooda" that will calculate where the pitches of individual strings will be in perfect tune according to the actual measurements of the piano strings in your piano. Is he wrong? No. If he is good at what he does, he will be listening way more than you might think and may be doing a lot more with his ear than you think despite the fancy "dooda lights".

Really, there are good tuners who are pretty much aural only tuners. There are good tuners who use electronics quite heavily. I am capable of doing it both ways and can do it well. I find the electronic inputs can make life easier, especially on pianos that are so poorly designed where there is no such thing as a "good" tuning. (I've had a few of those in the past.) I had one 6'ish grand that seemed very nice at first glance but had one octave just below middle C that was a total mess design wise and no matter how one tuned that octave, it would NOT match the whole rest of the piano. So where to put it? Unfortunately, reality isn't always pretty and electronics can sometimes calculate a "best fit" even when none really fits a whole lot easier than a frustrated tuner.

ShiroKuro

Bellyman there are good tuners who are pretty much aural only tuners. There are good tuners who use electronics quite heavily.

This has been my experience. I have had some very good tuners, and maybe three pretty bad ones. I don't judge them based on the tools they use, only on how the piano sounds when they finish, and with my current piano and my first acoustic upright (both very stable Yamaha pianos), I also judge the tuning based on how it sounds in the weeks and months afterwards. With a good tuning, my Yamahas have been incredibly stable. (I didn't just the beat up Baldwin or the Petrof in that way, those pianos were less robust...)

I have nothing but respect for piano tuners. Without them, my piano time would much, much less enjoyable!

Sophia

I love how you took my dooda and ran with it 😃 Agreed with everything you said!

Gombessa

@ShiroKuro, sorry to hear your tuning saga continues, but it sounds like you got some great advice and support on how to break it to your tuner.

I'm also VERY non-confrontational, and and in a pinch will come up with the most milquetoast excuse to not appear rude, but I agree with Bart and others that this really doesn't do the tuner any favors. In these situations, I just remind myself that for the tuner, it's a business, you're one of xx number of other customers, and nothing is personal; it's certainly less personal for him than it is with you! So it's best just to be upfront, say you found a tuner that you prefer, and that'll be that. I'd recommend keeping it courteous and polite of course, because you never know if you might want to switch back to him (or use him for something else) later and it doesn't help to burn bridges.

He'll understand that as a service industry professional, your satisfaction is ultimately the only metric that matters, regardless of how well he considers/knows his own tuning skill. It's all good.

Seeker

iternabe Does the opinion in this video make sense? He is saying a good digital is better than a bad acoustic;
I agree with him, though, of course, it all DEPENDS. When I was adjunct at a state university in Virginia, I was involved in replacing our aged, decrepit inventory. Based on a positive experience with a Yamaha N2 which was used as the office and practice piano by our theory teacher (who was also a prize winning pianist from Eastman), when we had the opportunity to get more pianos, we opted for two Novus NV-10s, one for use in a voice studio, the other in our choir room. They were a major improvement over two aged grands that had been there previously, and the fact that they were always in tune made a huge difference. We also opted for several non-hybrid higher end pianos in the practice rooms as well as two Kawai grands. The students preferred the hybrids, because they said there were things they could do with the hybrids they could not do with the acoustic instruments.

Finally, and this is not to demean or downplay the ability of anybody who might be reading this: it is my opinion that until you have reached a certain level in your ability to play the piano, the hybrid really is the better choice. There is an analogy in the world of automobiles - yes, it is true that a Porsche or high end Bimmer or Mercedes, or a Corvette, is going to do better in the hands of a highly skilled driver pushing the car to its limits at the track or (naughty, naughty) on a public street, but friends, good a driver as I am, I am no race driver, and I do not have the skill nor the innate natural ability to be able to drive the car (and not kill myself) to push it to its limits. Heck, I can even get myself in trouble cornering too quickly if I'm not careful with my 06 325-i, but I digress. Similarly, unless your playing can push a hybrid past its limits, be they in controlling tone, the exact degree of pedal, speed, dynamics, the hybrid can be a better choice.

Of course, if you have the budget and the room, go for the gold - get a Tier 1 grand, big as will fit. If you don't have the room, consider the Bechstein Konzert8. I'm fortunate to own one, and it is an amazing instrument which IMO is superior to many smaller grands.

Hope this is helpful to those involved in making piano buying decisions.

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