Many students struggle with getting good results because they are following incorrect instruction.
The videos below show you some of the piano tuning instructions that are just plain wrong.
But it's more than that. If these were just plain wrong, we could all figure that out easily. No. It's more insidious than that.
Sometimes these myths are right. That means that they sometimes work. But when they don't, we often think it's us.
It's not! It's this stupid piano! When that happens I call that gas lighting. It's when the piano tries to tell us that we suck. "See? You could do that before. Now you can't. You know why? Because YOU SUCK!"
Let's just say when I realized that the piano was trying to gas light me by allowing these myths to be true some of the time but not all of the time, me and the piano were no longer friends.
Knowing what information is false, and what is actually true, will save you hundreds of hours of time and frustration.
The Go APE Method taught on this website does not teach these myths but rather, merges modern technology with the art of piano tuning in a system that efficiently produces the best musical result possible.
Top Ten Piano Tuning Myths
Piano Tuning Myth #1:
"P4 beat at 1 beat per second wide" or "P5 beat narrow 3 times in 5 seconds"
Piano Tuning Myth #2:
"To tune well, you need to be able to tell small differences in beat speeds, and that's why it takes a long time to learn how to tune a piano by ear."
Piano Tuning Myth #3:
"You must NOT bend the pin, EVER!"
Piano Tuning Myth #4:
"You must always use the same hammer technique on each tuning pin. This produces the best stability"
Piano Tuning Myth #5:
"For the best stability, you must always put your hammer at 12:00 only."
Piano Tuning Myth #6:
"To get good stability, you must play each key really hard (test blows)"
Piano Tuning Myth #7:
“The best size octave in the temperament is the pure 4:2” or “The best size octave is the wide 4:2/narrow 6:3”
Piano Tuning Myth 8:
“Slowing pulling the tuning hammer produces poor stability”
Piano Tuning Myth #9:
“For best stability, you must always go sharp and then ease the pin back down"
Piano Tuning Myth #10:
“Electronic Tuning Devices (ETDs) produce a better tuning than the ear does.”