Hi all,

I regularly play bassoon in a few orchestras and whilst I value my tuner app for tuning prior to playing, I have noticed an ever-increasing trend of woodwind players who sit with their tuners on the stands and play according to tuner, not what they hear.

My last concert, it was particularly noticeable that certain pplayers were flat, but insisted the entire orchestra was harp according to their tuners (which was the case).

What is the point of playing with the tuners as a reference, as surely in detracts from the aural skills of listening to the harmonies around you?

Am learning cello at the moment and intonation is so difficult; it has had the effect of improving intonation in my bassoon playing, which I never thought was that bad previously. I think this perhaps explains my obession with intonation currently!

I would be interested in any thoughts on the matter above.

I'm just a lay person...

In daughter's orchestra they tune to oboe as is, I think, usual, but the oboe will try to ensure that their tuning is accurate using a meter.

Flat woodwind instruments are not as easy to sharpen as sharp ones are to flatten, so in the scenario you describe it seems reasonable (to me) for the strings to adjust to woodwind.

But I agree that everyone should be encouraged to rely on their ears rather than an electronic gadget.

I think the first oboe may have a tuner in front of them while the orchestra is tuning, and thereafter they should be banned for everyone.

My opinion is that you use your ears to play in tune, not your eyes.

And furthermore, orchestras don't play in equal temperament, to play really in tune you have to adjust the ptich to the context.


Chris

I agree with all the above. The conductor of one orchestra I'm in insists on tuning everyone individually. He obviously doesn't trust us to tune using our ears.


I don't think you can accurately determine whether the orchestra or individuals are in tune whilst playing, tuners don't act fast enough for that and yes, you have to use your ears to play in tune with those around you (hopefully someone is right!).

My goodness, where do people get the idea to do this from?! I'm surprised any conductors tolerate it, so perhaps it's just because they can't see them in use, hidden on stands.

Our conductor tune the orchestra with her iphone!

Tuning to a tuner, as a reference for A440, is a completely different matter to attempting to use one while playing music.

It's amazing what you see when you sit on the back row on the woodwinds....

Personally, I find the practice very irritating. Maybe its an amateur orchestra thing. I have no objection to using a tuner to tune intially, but when playing i don't see how it can be useful.

I don't see how you can really use a tuner when you are playing - unless you are playing really slow stuff and everyone else plays really quietly so that your tuner only pick up your playing.

Celloman26, I confess to being one of the guilty parties.

Actually, I agree with you - it's much better discipline to use your ear than refer to the tuner after the initial tuning. I think I leave the tuner there out of a sense of insecurity but I don't really use it. Maybe a curious glance from time when there is a solo with a long note to see how my ear is doing...

Our bassoonist, who was really, good has left our wind ensemble. I loved having her behind me and it made tuning / blending much easier with that lovely, deep good bass to "sit" on.

...Talk about being a 'conductor'! I thought the whole point of having them was to keep everyone in time and in tune? Obviously not...

I know this is but does the electric tuner tune to different pitches? As I play the violin (only started and yet to find another good teacher after moving houses...) which is a C instrument, and the clarinet which is a Bb instrument. I sort of need one for tuning at home - I am only -just- starting to develop aural tuning stills - violin has definitely helped with this one!

Do you mean a tuner which transposes? I haven't heard of one. They usually tune to concert pitch. It just means that when you use the tuner with your clarinet you need mentally to transpose what you are seeing on the tuner in relation to the note you are seeing on the page. Just as in the orchestra you presumably finger a B (as written for clarinet) in order for it to tune to concert A with the other instruments.

You can recalibrate some tuners to a different pitch eg a'=415 Hz for baroque music, instead of a'=440 Hz for modern orchestral music (or 442 in Europe). But I don't think that's what you're talking about.

Some smartphone apps might give the option of transposing? Anyway, I agree that you might as well use it as a chance to get your head around transposition.

Yes, it'll help my playing in the long term, and probably theory as well!

Mine allows me to chose what the instrument plays in (C, Bb, Eb or F). I have found this useful for the cor anglais as it saves me having to mentally transpose.

post deleted.

Trouble is, you're then tuning your instrument to something which may not be in tune with anyone else in the orchestra. You need to be in tune with as much of the ensemble as possible, whether or not they average out at 440Hz.

Maybe a quiet word with the conductor or the leader about possibly stopping to retune more frequently would be a good way to go?

Thats good... what brand is it? I want to buy one.

Mine's Korg TM40. It is a combined tuner-metronome.
I've never checked if it can transpose...

Exactly the point I was going to make. ET is for keyboards. It's surprising how many musicians do not appreciate this - ET is a compromise to enable keyboards to play approximately in tune in all keys by being slightly out-of-tune in all of them.

By all means get the initial A from the meter, but nothing else.

Therefore, if you played exactly according to ET you would often be out-of-tune - especially if you have the third of the chord, which is far too wide in ET (have a read of 'How equal temperament ruined harmony and why you should care').

Playing the viol this is a major issue as ET is not appropriate for the bulk of the viol repertoire.




Per my reply to other response, you're not going to get the right answer from teh meter - that's why you should not use them whilst playing (and to be honest many conductors probably do not understand this).

For example: if you have a chord of B (B D# F#) and you have the third of the chord and tune that D# to an ET meter, it will be WAY too sharp to be in tune. To be in tune, you would need to be FLAT compared to what the meter is telling you. Which is why we had the earlier comment of 'everyone was playing flat comapred to the meter'.

To be in tune harmonically, the diatonic (i.e. part of the key) sharps should be flattened and the diatonic flats should be sharpened.

To test this, play a continuous note that you can sing on a keyboard (electronic is easier - pick something with a 'clean' continuous sine-wave type sound). Sing the note and gradually increase in pitch by sliding up. You will hear a 'lock' when you reach in tune intervals. If you play the note (the 3rd, 4th, 5th etc) that you have reached you will find that the note you are singing does not agree with the keyboard: you are in tune, the keyboard has been tempered and so it is not in tune.

Could have done with having one to tune my piccolo at the Band concert I was at. Really struggle to tune an octave above the tuning note at the moment as I'm not that used to it. Add in all the noise of everyone else tuning and I didn't have a clue. Managed to tune to the other picc player (although we weren't playing together at any point), but think we were not at the same pitch as anyone else. Much easier to hear which way to go and compensate while playing for some reason, so managed to cope

Plus freezing church and switching between flute and picc at varying intervals added to the fun (picc is metal head) fortunately there was enough introduction/chat/"comedy" from compere to warm the lip plate with my hand so that actually playing wasn't too painful!

I've not noticed it in my amateur orchestra - I use mine to give the A and it then gets turned off and put away. Tuning tends to gradually drift upwards as people warm up - but that isn't really a problem if everyone is listening and drifts up together. Aside from that I don't think my tuner would work with background noise of people playing other notes so I don't think I could use it even if I was tempted.

It's a problem for the strings, who more often drift the other way - it's as much to do with rising humidity, from having so many people in the room, softening the wood of the instruments and allowing the strings to slacken slightly.

Call me old fashioned, but I have this device called a tuning fork that still sits in my oboe case, and I still use it for tuning over any new-fangled electronic device unless that is there is a need to tune to the organ or the piano (in which case I get my A from them first).

There are notes around the break where private practise with a tuner might be useful, but really my ear should tell me if I'm off, and the break is the area where an oboe is most exposed.

The conductor is in charge of rehearsals and each player should attempt to play aswell as they can, but excuse me, what are those two things on the side of your head for, surely your eyes are for reading the part and following the conductor and not for also trying to also second guess your chromatic tuner.

If the conductor detects a tuning problem let them ask for a new A from the oboe. Then it is up to the principal oboe to obtain that from either a tuning fork or a chromatic tuner and for the conductor to be happy with the effect and not anyone else to grumble at whether it agrees or disagrees with what their particular electronic device or version of perfect pitch might be telling them.

That, is just the way orchestras worked before electronics and should work now they are here (or else there are going to be a load of frustrated conductors facing a whole load of 'experts' telling them how to tune an orchestra (as if they didn't know).

Viols are weird beasts - usually the bottom two strings go the opposite way to the upper strings for some reason. This happens even when all strings are gut as opposed to 5 and 6 being overwound with wire (I don't use these at the moment). Mind you, the thicker strings are made by twisting strands of gut together, so they have a different construction to the top strings (1 & 2 are usually plain gut; 3 and 4 twisted; 5 & 6 high twist - possibly overspun with wire; 4 sometimes has a single open wound wire thread of silver or copper; 5 & 6 might be catlines - essentially platted like a rope).

It's probably a re-balancing from one side to the other, and of course humidity affects gut as well as wood!

It's normal with a violin, if you haven't noticed the E is badly out of tune (e.g. a quarter-tone or so) to have to return to the just-tuned D and G, because the change in pressure on the treble side has had the opposite effect on the bass.

For woodwind players, it is important to know what happens to their colleagues in the string section when their instruments get warm.

This is one reason why I feel tuning should be left to the conductor with one oboist giving the note. Otherwise it is a case of too many Officers and not enough regulars.

Certainly, but that doesn't mean that ongoing adjustments to one's instrument aren't appropriate, and string players certainly retune a string whenever there's a problem. The OP's description of tuners on stands suggests to me players who've never learnt to listen to the ensemble and balance their playing accordingly.

That goes without saying. However do you really need a device other than your ears to tell you how many hertz you are out?

I'd rather rely on my ears rather than have a bunch of people with black boxes on their stands tell me quite how out of tune that c# was when I was perfectly aware I'd played a duff note!

hi guys,

thank you all for your thoughts and comments.

You have restored my faith in aural abilities!

I shall continue to use my ears during ensemble playing.