Often when we tune pianos we are setting pitches to what we think sounds good.
For example, tuning unisons. We tune one string until the sound is pleasing.
The problem is, if our idea of what a good unison is, is faulty, our unisons will not be good.
Even if we know enough to tune higher partials beatless, and we tune the unison so that we can’t hear any beating partials, we don’t know for sure that the unison is pure. Maybe it isn’t but we just can’t hear the beat of the partials.
You see, when we tune a unison, for example, so that we think it sounds good, I call that an Internal Judgement and I rate that as the lowest form of judgement, because our concepts are fluid and faulty – some days are better than others. Whereas an External Judgement is always right on. We compare two things right in front of us.
Take this simple example.
Let’s say I gave you two shares of red and asked you which shade was lighter.
You would have no problem telling me that the right one was lighter. That’s because you are doing an External Judgement – comparing two things that are right in front of you. There is no need for you to retrieve some conceptual idea of what red is.
But let’s say I give you this shade of red…
…and asked you if this red was lighter or darker than a standard stop sign?
First, your brain would go into retrieval mode – “Where have I seen a stop sign? What colour was it? Is this it? OK I have an idea of the red in a stop sign. Now, is this colour lighter or darker than the one on the screen?”
I hope you can see all the problems with this.
“What is my idea of a red stop sign? Is it the same idea that other people have? Is the idea I have correct? Is my screen brightness too high, too low?”, etc.
This is an Internal Judgement and Internal Judgements are the worst kind. They have the most room for error and give the least accuracy.
However, they are the closest to us and as a result, many people hold on to these concepts for dear life. They don’t want to let go because they think letting go will be like letting go of a part of themselves.
If they would let go, they would find that there is another way that provides us with much better results; results we can be proud of, a method we can boast about and share, an idea that is also part of us and one we can hold on to; an idea worth holding on to.
Internal Comparisons are rife with inaccuracies.
Yet, that is exactly how many of us tune unisons.
Another way that is often taught is what I call an External Judgement/Comparison. I did not invent this. I only mention it because nobody really told me about it or emphasized its importance as a tool for quickly learning how to get concert level tunings fast.
The External Judgement procedure for tuning a unison comes from the following idea.
“A pure unison sounds like a single string.”
With this in mind, the procedure is simple:
- Tune your unison.
- Then mute off strings so only one string of the unison is free.
- Play the single string
- Now, simply compare the sound of the unison with the sound of the single string.
Now you are comparing two sounds that are right in front of you. No Internal Comparison. No Internal Judgement. No room for error.
If there is no difference in the sound, then your unison is as good as you can get it. Learn to hear smaller differences and your unisons will be even better.
That’s External Comparison or Judgement and there are dozens of ways we can do that at every step in the aural tuning process. And at each of these steps, if we use External Comparison, we give ourselves a break. We let ourselves off the hook for having to have this superhuman ideal of what a good tuning sounds like. As Jack Stebbins from North Bennet Street School used to say, “We let the piano tell us.”
If you want to learn where else in the piano that we can use External Comparison, just reach out.
