Why are Korg grand piano sounds +5ct at 440Hz (~441–441.5)? I know about spread, but wouldn’t you prefer 440Hz to be exact? C4 is +1ct, so maybe they just center the tuning along that.

But it’s nice to verify that a good default for spread is something like +5ct for C4 and +7–10ct for C5, with a larger increase for the very upper and lower octaves.

#pianotuning #piano

Please take this into account when building our #Robotic overlords that will presumably take many of our jobs. There is no substitute for intuition, experience and in this case, a good ear. “You don’t know how bad most things are nor precisely HOW they are bad” - and that’s important, not only in #PianoTuning

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PJu2HhKsyTEJMxS9a/you-don-t-know-how-bad-most-things-are-nor-precisely-how

You don't know how bad most things are nor precisely how they're bad
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/PJu2HhKsyTEJMxS9a/you-don-t-know-how-bad-most-things-are-nor-precisely-how
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41311135

Interesting read about piano tuning

#LessWrong #pianos #PianoTuning #music #sound #SoundQuality

Arduino Piano Tuner is Pitch Perfect

[JanHerman] knows that tuning musical instruments is all about precision and that precision is measured in a logarithmic unit called a cent. A cheap tuner unit might be accurate to 1.5 cents which sounds good until you look at one for ten times the price and find it is accurate to 0.1 cents. So you can spend $800 for precision or $60 for something less. [Jan] decided to build something better and cheaper using a 32-bit Arduino and a DDS frequency generator chip on a breakout board.

Oddly enough, the device doesn't have a display. Instead, it generates a precise frequency and couples it to the piano using a transducer. You tune the string to the corresponding note. The post has a lot of detail about how piano tuning works.

If you know about the chromatic scale, the equal temperament system, and how many cents are in an octave, you might want to skip the first section. We didn't though. If we learned any of that in childhood piano classes, we've forgotten it.

For those whose quest for precision isn't that critical, note that the difference between two notes can be as little as 0.3316 Hz. It is interesting that the final design isn't the first one [Jan] attempted and there is an explanation of why the first design wasn't successful.

The final design calls for a 24-position rotary switch which is tough to find. We might have opted for a rotary encoder and a display or even some LEDs to make a cheap alternative. As it was, the cheap switch used caused problems and required a replacement and very careful soldering.

We've seen self-tuning pianos and the use of an oscilloscope for tuning, but those links are long dead. More recently, we've seen an old piano hacked for ragtime and if you decide you are giving up on piano lessons, you can always convert your instrument into a workbench.

#arduinohacks #musicalhacks #dds #piano #pianotuning