On the subject of piano tuning with digi pianos?

I have a pianist who has been visiting frequently and we are trying to work up some arrangements.

The piano parts are central and so an uncertainty about tuning seems more crucial than when I work with funky electro keyboard sounds as backing voices.

Anyways... just trying to be honest.



In any event, my guest has asked to work at A=444Hz rather than the 440. He has ideas about it... I like what he's doing. Etc.


I set up Kontakt with the New York piano and set the tuning to 444.

I have set my tuner to 444 and am using that to tune the bass and guitar.

It seems to be working out but it has raised a lot of questions for me.

I've been using Stretch tuning in Kontakt.

Now I just want to think through everything again and get the best harmonics.


I am struggling to get my bass guitar to sound "sweet." I've worked up a really simple part so I don't think I'm getting crazy voicings. I have even tried Melodyne at 444... it felt as if the pre Melo'd track was more in tune with the piano than the one I tried "tuning".



So, I know that's all kind of random... maybe someone has some thoughts to share.

Maybe I should try equal tempered? Stuff like that.


Thanks.


best regards,
mike


 

dang... I pressed something and the post went away.... start over.


If the piano player wants to play at 444, and it sounds good..... do it. 

Changing the pitch, even slightly does add a new dynamic to the music. We see this in key changes in a song and the result is a new level of energy. 

As far as having instruments on 2 different but very close pitches.... 444 and 440 ... well, how well that works will be a call for you to make as you listen. Some purists will hear the difference.....other folks may not. If I recall.... The Band and The Grateful Dead didn't really worry too much about getting everything tuned perfectly even in the studio....and it made their sound instantly recognizable. 

I have known a few people in my time who insisted that something other than 440 was better sounding to them. With a tuner, it is easy enough to do. I had to do that when I played in a church orchestra for a time. the piano was slightly sharp. I simply made a mental note of the degree and tuned accordingly. the PITB was the piano in the choir room and the one on the stage were not in tune to each other. I verified this as well. This was eventually remedied.

All in all, it's an issue that only you will be able to determine what works and what doesn't..... but tuning everything to 444 is the safe bet initially. 

And I do believe melodyne can be set to center on 444. Sometimes the "off pitch" factor make the music more interesting.... as long as it's not noticeably distracting.

My assumption on this is that you are speaking about a digital or softsynth based piano. 


It's just too freaking hard to change the tuning of a real piano by 4 cents.  A few piano tuners I have known have all said they tune using pitch forks mostly and only tune certain notes to the pitch fork or tuner.... they tun the rest by ear since due to the nature of the beast, a perfectly tuned piano often does not sound good. Some notes simply must be tuned sharp or flat to make it work and sound alive. 

I used to buy 4 Bazooka Joe bubble gums for four cents.... not anymore.

I'd tell him to suck it up and deal with 4 cents... 440 is the standard, "DEAL WITH IT!" The iron fist in the iron glove approach? It's like Morbo from Futurama, and you can't go wrong with it.

I will not speak for my guest.

It would be silly for me to attempt to explain what he is thinking, I haven't made the journey he has... it is my role to offer hospitality and create a comfortable atmosphere where he can conjure up a good performance.

He asked if I could set it to 444... I said "yes:.



What I can offer as loosely related info is an excerpt I just copied from the Native Instruments New York Acoustic Grand manual:

"In keeping with the tradition, the piano was recorded at 443 Hz. Our feeling is that with this slightly higher tuning the tones tend to „sing“ better. After the initial recording sessions, it was re-tuned to 440 Hz; ensuring that the „singing“ tonal quality was retained and at the same time conforming to our standard tuning."

Ideas like this are floating around all over the place... I'm guessing a teacher or vocal coach instilled this interest in my guest many years ago... he rehearses this way.








The manual reminded me that stretch tuning is a poor choice for accompaniment with other instruments so I switched to equal tempered.

I had it in stretch because it sounded good by itself... it sounds better with the accompaniment in equal.



Thanks.


best regards,
mike

And as I pointed out tuning the original piano sounds to 444 produced a nicer sound for the samples for Kontakt. I don't doubt that. We are talking an acoustic instrument here. But to have to play them back at 444 is questionable though. Obviously they retain their desirable qualities either at 444 or 440. So why not use them at 440 instead. 

If a client came into my setup and insisted on working at 444, I would want some good justifiable reasons for doing so. It can be a problem as you have to tune everything from that point on up to this new ref tuning frequency. I have found that when you do this it can be hard to get everything in tune (It shouldn't be but for some reason it is and in the end you have to use your ear much more often to keep things in tune and that can be hard as well) and you have to remember to put everything back!

Herb you reminded me of my Technics direct drive turntable which has got a great speed control for those very reasons. I think it could be safe to say that tuning in the past perhaps in rock and pop circles was maybe a little unattended. Bands may have tuned to a piano in the room but who is to say where that piano tuning was at. Or they may have not tuned well for some reason. (and by that I mean to A = 440, the tuning within itself can be very good and sound sweet but just not at A=440) Early synthesisers had some tuning issues I can tell you. I lived through all that. Trying to keep them on pitch just long enough to do a take. Some bands like Pink Floyd got it right though because I think Dave Gilmour was a bit of a stickler for tuning and Richard Wright fiddled with things until it sounded sweet.

Also with all the experimentation with varispeeding multitrack machines and doing things like that some errors may have crept in there. Possibly because someone may not have rest the multi to the zero position speed wise and it was left a tiny bit sharp or flat but no one noticed at the time. (I have done it myself!)

Mastering engineers had the options of varispeeding the final two track and I think they may have done. The artist may have wanted the song just a tad faster/or slower so they could have adjusted the master tape slightly fast/slow. Also accidents have happened where the master two track was played at the wrong speed and the vinyl pressings were done from that.

All good reasons why tracks ended up out of tune. (by that I mean in reference to A = 440 but it can also mean the obvious and instruments out of tune within themselves and with others) Also many turntables I am sure may have not been completely accurate either. My Technics is full of electronics, I have never seen so much inside a turntable yet all it's doing is spinning the platter very accurately and making fine speed adjustments.

Today I think we are onto very accurate tuning right at the source now and our DAW's are not altering the speed or pitch either which is a blessing. The final product and its playback is not altering tuning either. Synths now are far better than they used to be. We are better at hearing out of tune things and making sure we keep things in tune all the time. 'In tune' can mean in tune to the ear not necessarily in tune on a meter. But starting on a meter is good thing to do I think.

A quote from Wikipedia:

Current concert pitches A = 440 Hz is the only official standard and is widely used around the world. Many orchestras in the United Kingdom adhere to this standard as concert pitch.[8] In theUnited States some orchestras use A = 440 Hz, while others, such as New York Philharmonic and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, use A = 442 Hz.[9] The latter is also often used as tuning frequency in Europe,[2] especially in Denmark, France, Hungary, Italy, Norway and Switzerland.[10] Nearly all modern symphony orchestras in Germany and Austria and many in other countries in continental Europe (such as Russia, Sweden and Spain) tune to A = 443 Hz.
In practice the orchestras tune to a note given out by the oboe, and many oboists use an electronic tuning device. When playing with fixed-pitch instruments such as the piano, the orchestra will generally tune to them—a piano will normally have been tuned to the orchestra's normal pitch. Overall, it is thought that the general trend since the middle of the 20th century has been for standard pitch to rise, though it has been rising far more slowly than it has in the past. Some orchestras like the Berliner Philharmoniker now use a slightly lower pitch (443 Hz) than their highest previous standard (445 Hz).[11][2]
Many modern ensembles which specialize in the performance of Baroque music have agreed on a standard of A = 415 Hz.[2] An exact equal-tempered semitone lower than A = 440 would be 440/21/12 = 415.3047 Hz; this is rounded to the nearest integer. In principle this allows for playing along with modern fixed-pitch instruments if their parts are transposed down a semitone. It is, however, common performance practice, especially in the German Baroque idiom, to tune certain works to Chorton, approximately a semitone higher than A-440 (460–470 Hz) (e.g., Pre-Leipzig period cantatas of Bach).[12]
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Interesting.....