How do you tune a piano?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 มิ.ย. 2024
- Why is each note on a piano slightly out of tune and how do piano tuners listen differently to the rest of us? Piano technician Ara Vartoukian explains the art and science of piano tuning.
0:29 Art or science?
0:55 First steps
1:23 What are harmonics?
2:30 What is equal temperament?
4:03 Tuning the first octave
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How a Piano Works is a series of five videos explaining everything you wanted to know about the piano. Subscribe to watch them all.
11 June: How a piano works
13 June: How to tune a piano
18 June: Why play the piano?
25 June: How to play the piano (in only six weeks)
2 July: What makes a great pianist?
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Okay, that seals it. I'm leaving this to the pros!
Lol its easier than I thought
instablaster.
My Lester grant has a year mark underneath the body and it tells me my piano was. Built over 100 years ago
??
.what is it's worth
What is it worth today
My mother started a second career as a RPT in her 50s. I remember her taking the classes initially for fun and it taking her a couple of days to tune a whole piano in the beginning. After becoming a professional she could do it in 45-60 min. She taught me enough for me to know I don’t have the patience for this kind of work. Much respect to the tuner technicians out there.
Yeah digital piano or free reed organ it is.
He explained it well but since my brain was out of tune it created inharmonious thought patterns.
Relative tuning on a guitar is easy using harmonics. I wouldn't know where to begin on a piano. This was very interesting. Thank you. What I thought was neat was how some notes sound better a bit sharp and others sound better a bit flat. On My guitar I always tune G a bit flat and high E a bit sharp then find where the B fits in. It sounds better to me. This was a fascinating video.
they explained this quite well but i honestly did not absorb any of the info lmao
Finally a video that explains the science and not just "tune each string to pitch". I'm glad he discusses equal temperament vs just intonation
Hoestly, this wasnt even in any way a helpful explanation. It served to show that the subject of tuning is more difficult than what ppl think. But having looked into just intonation based systems, i can say in most cases ppl will want their pianos to be in ET anyway. Its not practical to tune in more natural tunings. Unless you have a specific piece, in a specific key, or keys. And tuning to ET is honestly not that difficult. Any tuner app can give that basic capacity... so ppl shouldnt really suffer a badly tuned piano for their practices, or have to fork out for a technician every time they want some simple retuning...
i literally looked this up cuz i was like "how hard could this really be", i think he did a really good job explaining why it's a lot trickier to do than a guitar for example. pretty interesting stuff!
Lol. My violinist wants to attempt tuning my son's piano...
@@Mom2MrBabyHaikin
Best of luck with that one. I hope the violinist has a good sense of humour. He/she will need it when reality sets in 😆
@@Jack-hy1zq Lol... He has perfect pitch, but no tools yet. He is actually a pianist and composer and teacher atop... Reality really already set in, because it's expensive to tune every 3 months (he & my son use piano), haha!
@@Mom2MrBabyHaikin
No, reality will set in when the violinist begins to understand that there is no correlation between being a musician and one's ability to tune a piano. IE. I know concert piano tuners, tuning for world class concert pianists, who cannot play the piano AT ALL!
And being able to tune a piano has nothing AT ALL to do with one's perception of pitch, perfect or otherwise. To become a piano tuner takes years of practice on hundreds, if not thousands, of pianos. That is why having a piano tuned is not cheap. It is highly skilled work. And you think the violinist can tune the very first piano he/she ever attempts to tune! The violinist is in real danger of damaging the piano. Your post reminds me of myself before I trained to become a piano tuner 40 years ago.
@@Jack-hy1zq Our piano is used and I got it for $400. More concerned about his fingers than piano here. He is also pianist and has been on stage. Some violin teachers charge a lot too & also for a reason. Not all are created equal. Some try to charge less, so more parents can allow kids to study. Thanks for explaining... I have not a clue...
This is, by a country mile, the best quick low down of what to think about when tuning a piano that I've found so far on my long youtube rabbit hole. Thanks.
Also an excellent explanation of WHY equal temperement is a thing.
It is as said: " If you don know how to explain your craft in an easy way. You dont know the craft well enough. "
This is remarkably helpful and concise. Bravo!
Informative, brief and to the point that demonstrates some of the detail about the art of piano tuning.
Congrats… This seems to be one of the best descriptions of how to tune a piano professionally. I’m tuning pianos since 15 years and I couldn’t explaine it better ;)
Awesome video with a even greater explanation
Very inspiring and informative, love it! Thanks!
One of the best Teacher I have on the Internet.
I think I have learned how to tune stringed instruments better without even realizing it. Thanks for the informative video!
Excellent explanation thanks
awesome! hats off to this man.
I had a tuner explain to me what he was doing. It seemed to make sense and after some messing around, I was able to reproduce it moderately well. The idea is to set the center strings for an octave in the middle of the piano, making fifths a tad narrow and fourths a tad wide, and then once thirds and sixths are possible tests with them for being reasonable are carried out, until the circle of fifths has been completed. From there, set other octaves in turn first down then up from the initial reference octave, keeping in mind the stretch tuning towards the extreme bass and treble ends. Set the adjacent strings to the tuned strings, check the whole keyboard for sounding reasonable, and Roberta's your aunt. At least in principle.
To be able to set just one string at a time for a single key, either a damping felt strip or a rubber wedge is used to mute the strings that one does not want to be sounding.
For some reason I found it easier to do this with an upright than with a grand. Maybe it had something to do with the overtones.
Once I got a decent digital piano, which was more than 15 years after I began to learn acoustic piano, I hated to go to any other kind unless it was a pretty recently tuned acoustic piano. Still, decent acoustic pianos in tune sound absolutely gorgeous.
You are super smart and interesting. I am intrigued and grateful
Wow, Mr. Vartoukian, thank you very much for making this video! For the last several months I have been contemplating tuning my Baldwin upright spinet myself. I bought the piano new in 1988. It is still in good playing condition, has been tuned only about three times in its lifetime, but is now noticeably out of tune in a few places. I think the hammers need a little softening in a few places as well. Since this is an inexpensive instrument I am going to attempt to learn how to tune it myself. Your video is an excellent guide. Thank you for posting this!
This video is a great explanation of the 'easy' aspect of tuning a piano: why equal temperament exists and what to listen for. However, it does not delve into the difficult aspect: how to correctly use the tuning lever. It is this aspect that requires years of practice on hundreds/thousands of pianos to become a competent tuner... because, in this respect, every piano has its own, unique set of challenges. I am not trying to dissuade you from trying to tune your own piano....mmm, well, actually, I am. It is highly skilled work. You cannot just one day decide to tune a piano because you watched a TH-cam video. Years of practice. I'm retired now. Tuned thousands of pianos - from old bangers to concert Steinways.
@@Jack-hy1zq Referencing something similar you said below: does this mean your first few hundred jobs were junk, or what?
Now that's the way to explain it!
There's a nice amount of music theory in tuning a piano
Well that’s why he is a piano ‘technician’. Interesting technicality.
Obviously this guys a pro it just was too deep for me
Ara is at the very top of the profession (internationally), so you’ve been watching a master explain things 🙂
Tuning a concert piano in Jenolan caves with birds chirping.. after a 3hr winding drive over the Blue Mountains. That's Herculean!
Damn that's a lot more technical than i thought, interesting
Why am I watching this at 2 am? I don't even have a piano.
He explains it really well!
I guess if he wants to waste his time and his customers money when the app would do just as good a job.
Very interesting, I might try and tune a mates piano, I had no idea of stretch tuning before, going to be fun with zero experience!
There is no way you can do it. To even try is foolish. There is too much to learn...too many variables. Tuners charge $100 because it took them years and many hundreds of pianos to learn. And, what? You're just going to defy reality?
@@Jack-hy1zq Maybe if he had to do it for any old piano he came across. But practicing on a junker that no one really cares about is at least a way to learn about that junker. If the tuner I used could explain it to me and I later could practice it on my piano and then could duplicate it on another similar piano... well I guess that's not many hundreds, exactly.
I wish you could tune my newly rebuilt 1913 grand. Are you ever in the states?
A well trained ear is an amazing thing.
I’d like more information on tuning, since I started getting paid to tune pianos locally. Most of the jobs are pianos that have been out for more than 10 years which is good practice, but I know I could be more efficient and effective at it. The equal temperament is definitely a trick since (reiterating) most pianos I tune have been sitting too long.
Really Interesting, and thanks for posting this. Could I please ask you opinion ( not that I'm doubting others, I might add ) .
I have a nice upright piano circa early 1920s, as far as I can ascertain from my research. I've had it over 40 years, during which time it's been tuned numerous times, as you might expect. Generally, it's about semitone flat, or slightly more, and as you might expect some notes are further out than others.
My question is this. In the past, once or twice, I've asked the Tuner if it's possible to tune my piano nearer to the full pitch of ? 440 ?.
However, the response I've had is, due to its age it's safer just to tune it, ""To it's Self"" i.e. slightly flat. As you'd probably end up breaking a number of strings and running up a fairly substantial bill.
How bigger risk is this in opinion ( and I fully accept it's your opinion and not a guarantee in anyway)
Many thanks
Roj
I had a tuner warn me about the same thing on an old upright. The strings begin to gather corrosion over all those years in most environments due to sufficient moisture. This could create weak places that would give way upon significant tightening. Once one does start replacing strings, even apart from the cost (and it could conceivably be done DIY), they are also going to make the piano sound different for those notes. A full pitch raise for a piano that old is normally done in conjunction with replacing all the strings. I chose to have the tuner raise the pitch barely perceptibly, and the strings held up.
I was thinking of tuning piano myself, but looks harder than I thought.
So, what happens if I tune each note individually using a chromatic tuner app? would it be good enough?
Are the high notes really tuned higher and low notes tuned lower than what they should be ? I tune my piano with an app
And how does it sound to you? Are you happy with it or do you feel it can be better?
Yes, because your app is making those adjustments for you, but only based on theory. But, an app will NEVER be able to account for EACH instrument. My piano sounds like garbage when a tech uses an app. When a tech uses their ear after starting with A4, then the piano is AMAZING.
Yes, that is correct. When tuning at concerts I was often asked for a stretched tuning. They were asking to make sure I was good enough for the job. If YOU have a piano...tune the lower bass notes pure. When they are played together they sound in tune. (Mathematically, they are). But if you play the higher note first, hold it down, then immediately after, play the lower note, the lower note sounds SHARP..the opposite is true in the treble ie hold the lower note first , then immediately after, play the upper note..sounds FLAT. It's exactly as he said in the video: the higher the pitch, the flatter your ears perceive the pitch to be. The lower the pitch, the higher your ears perceive the pitch to be. The bass has to be very gradually tuned flat, the treble very gradually sharp.
@@Jack-hy1zq Thanks !
Mu old piano is ready for the knackers yard.. I need a pro to give it a new life! 🎹
How do you make the semitone wider and the G narrower?
Listen to prefect fifths, fourths, thirds and sixths how these intervalls WOULD sound in theory if perfectly tuned and then you slightly lower or higher the interval between the two notes. This is called equal temperament. You tune slightly wrong on purpose so that the big pictures sounds approximately correct. If you would tune in perfect intervals you wouldn't notice much within one octave but if you play 2 notes a couple octaves away from each other you'll hear an awful sound
When they showed the harmonics above A and D on the charts, the A harmonic above A4 was 880hz but the A harmonic above the D was 881hz. Is this due to equal temperament tuning?
It depends on how the harmonic was reached, adding a fifth to a fourth or using a direct octave. In equal temperament, the fourths and fifths end up slightly fudged so that octaves are accurate.
How long does it typically take to tune a piano?
If you're good and really know what you're doing, about an hour. It takes me about 3 hours!
This video seems very informative, but I can't wrap my head around how it's possible that the last note in the 4 minor thirds is flat compared to the last note in the 3 major thirds, when both notes are the exact same note and octave? How did that happen? Is it the illusion created by the underlying notes played that causes this?
Edit: I listened to it again, and I guess the idea is that that notes that are an octave apart should fit harmonically into both major thirds and minor thirds of the scale? Meaning notes that are an octave apart aren't meant to be exactly tuned mathematically?
I think that he is saying that when you tune it with 3rds and 4ths, then it won't line up. Maybe notes tuned to 4ths will sound better with 2.999, whereas 3rd will be 4.1111. Do you know what I mean?
The simplest way to explain the problem is tuning a guitar by ear. If you work you way across the fret board tuning each adjacent string perfectly to its neighbour by the old fashioned 5 and 4 fret method, and then compare the top and bottom E strings to each other they will be slightly out of tune.
To get a perfect octave between the top and bottom E strings every one of the strings in between needs to be tuned ever so slightly away from perfect. An electronic guitar tuner will do that adjustment for you (hence why you will often see it described as a equal temperament tuner).
If that problem exists over just 6 strings, imagine the problem over 88 strings.
0:16 guys can anyone pls tell me what's the name of this piece I've been looking for it for ages but I can't remember its name 😔 😭
Hi Fatima - it's the opening of Grieg's Piano Concerto.
finally somebody who knows how do tune a Piano ! way to go Pro , I have a different approach , but been tuning ( by ear )and building pianos for 40 Years . Bosendorfer (: way to go ! but noone tunes a 1000 Pianos a year ! I am a concert Tuner and Piano maker
What is the name of the piano you make?
@@Jack-hy1zq I worked for Bosendorfer and now have build soundboards after plus replacing soundboards , off course the rest. retired .Anton Zanesco nature forever youtube
@@ANTONZANESCO
Ok. Apologies. I was being a bit literal.
I learned tuning pianos at Leeds College of Music many years ago. The teacher technicians were Alasdair Laurence and Ken Forrest. They literally built their own pianos - Laurence and Naish (I've probably murdered the spelling/s)...they were excellent pianos but of course they could not compete with mass production. The pianos they made were consequently too expensive compared to their competitors.
1000 pianos a year is 20 per week. 4 a day. That is very doable. My mentor did at least that many.
I’m not that aggressive.
HOW DO YOU TUNE A PIANO?
Me thinking I’ll be able to do it myself... 🙄.
Thousand pianos a year!? Does the man ever do things we other do; you know, eat, sleep, the loo etc? Here in Scandinavia we've got about 365 days a year.
I'd expect a professional tuned to do 4 or 5 pianos a day, so 200 working days in a year. There is your 1000 pianos a year.
It is possible for a piano to be tuned but not tuned according to the correct “ pitch”. I had a “ professional piano technician” in today to try to tune my grand piano. He actually had middle C sounding like a B natural. I have perfect pitch. I stopped him and asked him to leave. He was using an iPhone app which did not give the correct starting pitch for A4. It was a whole “ step” flat. How can a trained professional with 40 years experience…according to him…not be able to hear the problem? I can be in another room and tell you what notes are being played and in what key….IF the piano is tuned correctly. It is hard for me to understand why others cannot do the same thing. I could do that as a child. I am 75 now. Perfect pitch is a nuisance! Mostly! And very much misunderstood. My dad played the violin and had perfect pitch. My granddaughter has “ the gift” as well. She is a senior in college majoring in music education. She, as did I, could sing harmony before she was four years of age. Her siblings have a good “ear”, but not perfect pitch.
I think that 'lever' is actually a 'sonic screwdriver'
How do you tuna fish?
Computers have definitely made this process way easier
1000 IN A year? 3 in each working day? Located in the same area?
Not all piano tunings are alike. Just like windows can look opaque while others look clear. Most piano tuners have no musical background nor can play the piano. They tune by listening to waves, and not by musical intuition. Some pianos are tuned to sound bright and others to sound dull.
I've tuned about 300 pianos but since I play about 10 instruments it makes it alot easier of what to listen too.
"Most piano tuners have no musical background nor can play the piano". That statement is incorrect. The majority of piano tuners are actually quite decent players, some even being conservatory graduates who couldn't make a go of the performance world and don't want to be the usual piano teacher. SOME piano tuners 'have no musical background nor can play the piano'.
Piano's are NOT tuned to sound bright or 'dull' (I assume you really meant mellow). Tuning has no impact on this character. They can be 'voiced' to change their tonal character, but that has nothing to do with tuning.
An expert can design a website using word press or they can make things much harder on themselves by doing it all in code (html etc). Similarly a piano tuner can can match coincident partials and determine stretch with thier brain or use an advanced tuning app. The tuning apps were designed to do the same exact thing those who tune by ear do. I can use double octaves and arpeggios to determine if my stretch is accurate. I don't need to use a tuning fork or count and compare beat speeds of various partials. I don't need what your advocating slowing me down unecessariuly IM running a business not only to support myself but not to waste my customers money. The Pianos technicians Guild requires that the way you tune be used on their tuning test in order to be considered "competent." I see no point in it.
As someone else just asked before you, an app can't account for each instrument. My piano, as I mentioned, sounds like garbage when a tech tunes it to an app, but sounds amazing when done as this video demonstrates. I had a tech once start with an app and immediately realize that it was going to sound bad. As far as time and customer's money? Using an app will take longer than using your ear.
I have to agree.
I had the first piano tuner who tune like the technician in this video. Sound marvellous and never miss a note untuned.
Second technician tunes using app and always miss some notes obviously untuned.
Making me not wanting to touch the piano at all =(
Can you come and tune my piano?🤩
Don't you just tune to the frequency of the phone app?
The background music is nice but it drives me crazy. I’m trying to concentrate on the pitches he’s playing and the music comes back in and ruins my ears.
I totally agree. What intellectual giant thought it a good idea to put a tinkling piano in the background of an article on tuning a piano?
How can we hear the beat notes with that rubbish going on?
Every tuner I have ever worked with (and myself included) simply mutes the temperament and then tunes by octaves with a chromatic tuner. Why are you making this so much more difficult than it has to be?
I had a digital piano which actually allowed for three tuning stretches: none, normal, and wide. It was possible for me to hear a qualitative difference between the settings.
Shouldn't a piano be tuned to equal temperament? If you're tuning by harmonics, you'd be using just intonation. Also, the octave stretch is due to the piano string harmonics being slightly sharp from what they would be on a perfect string. Longer strings (like on a concert grand) behave more ideally and need less octave stretch, while shorter strings (like on a small console upright) need more.
I came here to switch careers. This is too much.
Me too. Ahhh
And this is why piano tuning is so expensive.
Piano tuning is easy.... Said me never 😂
You make zero mention that 99.99% of pianos need a major or massive pitch raise
If they haven't been constantly kept up, yes they do, but I get the idea that he mainly services well kept pianos. I heard that Liberace had his piano tuned once a week.
Sorry, string physics do not allow a piano to produce harmonics. The term is misused in this context. Harmonics are integer multiples of the fundamental pitch. Strings produce overtones that are higher in frequency than their expected pitch due to the rigidity of wire, amongs other things.
True, but it's a colloquial in this context. Imagine if I were playing modern music were Harmonics were indicted in the instructions, but they had to write out "play the overtone higher in frequency than its expected pitch due to the string being thicker on the composer's piano than the student's CASIO." :D
Good point RG. But since many (most, I imagine) other musical instruments (& sounds) produce harmonics, it's less confusing in an informal context to refer to overtones in the same way - it's an accepted industry practice, if you will
Sometimes another word works better for the audience. But you are correct, and we do need to use the right words, lest we make lazy thinkers.
I can't even tune my violin.
You can't. You're welcome.
u r confusion
I have perfect pitch.
It doesn’t exist
@@orgue3461 Yes it does. I have it
@@mattyshredz1071 🤣
@@orgue3461 you are just jealous
@@mattyshredz1071 Now you're catching on. That's called irony