My pal literally reached across the darkened theater to restrain me.  He was absolutely certain that I was going to heave my Diet Coke at the guy in the tie-dyed shirt on the movie screen. 

We'd gone to see "Note by Note,” a movie that follows the yearlong process of the making of one particular Steinway D Concert Grand ("L1037") from start to ebony high-gloss finish. I was honored that a filmmaker had created a documentary providing the public a rare glimpse into our esoteric world--one in which we craft wood, iron, steel, leather and felt into the ultimate vehicle of artistic expression. While the film was a bit dry, I enjoyed it--at least until the on-screen comment from one of Steinway's “rough tuners.” He uttered proudly,

Excuse me?

Wow. How does this statement irk me? Let me count the ways. Has someone told this guy that the world is actually round and not flat? Amazing. I honestly thought that kind of nonsense had stopped being perpetrated onto a gullible public along with polyester leisure suits and platform shoes.

Never mind the obvious fallacy that a piano “gets its soul” not by decades of countless meticulous design and material choices, but via the method by which it was tuned during its manufacture. (Ironically, we don’t hear a single in-tune piano until near the end of the movie.) Let's address the fundamental flaw in his statement--it's based on a false argument: either you tune by ear OR you tune by machine. Either you like mashed potatoes OR you like French fries. Either you throw your popcorn OR your Diet Coke at the movie screen (ultimately, I decided on neither realizing I was just out of striking range.)

As far as tuning methods and their respective end results go, can we all agree on at least one thing here? What matters is the music, not the means. In other words, how you get the piano sounding trumps how you got there, yes? Then let’s all say it loudly enough to be heard in Queens, N.Y.: What matters is the music, not the means. This is my mantra in ALL areas of piano servicing. I've heard both great and lousy tunings done by both aural and ETD (Electronic Tuning Device)-assisted tuners, so one's chosen tuning method is a guarantee of exactly nothing. The last time I checked, "Equal Temperament" is the "equal" (hey, it even says it in the title!!) division of an octave into pleasing uniformity of the intervals contained therein. Ergo, I hope we can all concur that at the heart of a great tuning you have a temperament area with nice, clean octaves, perfectly still unisons and smoothly progressing intervals (thirds, fourths, fifths, tenths, seventeenths, etc.) beating at a slightly faster rate as you advance chromatically up the keyboard. What matters most is how the piano actually sounds. When a pianist sits down to play the piano with the above-described tuning and together they produce mellifluous, musical beauty, who gives a toss about how the tuner arrived at this? Honestly.

Many years ago, I heard the common query "Do you tune by ear or by machine?" My stock answer was "yes." While I learned to tune strictly by ear and became a Craftsman PTG member with just a tuning fork way back when the Dead Sea was still the Sick Sea, eventually I, like so many of my respected colleagues, began incorporating state-of-the-art technology into my tuning process. I say eventually because early ETDs (i.e., hamster-powered “strobe” tuners) were hindered by the false assumption that all pianos should be tuned the same. Of little surprise to most piano technicians is the fact that all pianos have varying amounts of "inharmonicity" (for any non-tuners or neophytes out there, simply put, this is the property of the overtone series to be out of tune to the fundamental.) Every piano therefore demands its own custom tuning!

Thankfully, in a free market where word-of-mouth is King, a tuner's business will grow commensurate to the quality of the results he/she produces. I'm grateful to say that for ages now, I've been blessed with more high-end piano servicing than I can handle and consequently that worn-out "ear or machine" question hasn't surfaced since the Fred Flintstone era.

So . . . can we please finally bury this inane "either/or" false argument once and for all? If you're a tuner who tunes with nothing but a tuning fork ... for God’s sake, go put some clothes on! ... Seriously, if this is the case, I encourage you to check out the wonderful world of the latest and greatest ETDs, most of which can even memorize your best aural tunings for you! Trust me, you won't mysteriously, suddenly become deaf, dumb and blind. Your well-trained ears will finally get a visual representation of what they've been interpreting solo for years. Season to taste. Lo and behold, you just might be surprised to find it could help you become a better aural tuner!

More importantly, if you are a tuner relying solely on an ETD, I strongly urge you to learn more about the wonderful world of counting beats and manually solving the Rubik's cube that is each temperament we set. I once heard an ETD-only tuner argue that because none of his clients complained, he obviously was doing great tunings. I say that we technicians should hold ourselves to a much higher standard than any of our clients ever will. Learning the rudiments of aural tuning is vital to becoming an expert technician. How else can one truly know whether or not they've achieved the desired end result? (Which is another reason I always encourage my colleagues to learn to play the piano / become better and better pianists. The more accomplished of a player you are, the more discerning of a piano technician you can become!) Decades ago, when he administered my PTG tuning exam to me, the venerable piano technician Jim Coleman related a story along those lines. He'd given an exam to an ETD-only tuner and the tuner had mistakenly tuned one particular note a half-step sharp and wasn't even aware of it. Jim just calmly said, "You know, some customers might not like their piano tuned that way."

While my personal belief is that the optimal approach is the combination of a well-trained ear with state-of-the-art technology, at the end of the day I honestly couldn't care less if you accomplished your tuning with the aid of a tuning fork, an ETD or a magic wand and invisible fairies.

Steinway certainly has every right to tune their pianos however they may wish. My sole point here is that ultimately, every tuning should be judged by its musicality and precision. Period. Why? Say it with me, ya'll, “What matters is the music, not the means!”

Jim Wilson is the owner of L.A. Piano Services and has been an RPT member of the Piano Technician’s Guild since 1980.  He is mostly gregarious, though evidently occasionally irascible, and is a member of the PTG’s L.A. Chapter. More info at http://www.lapianoservices.com.