Re: tuning accuracy

On Thursday, June 5, 2003, at 04:37 , tuning@yahoogroups.com wrote:

> Kurt Bigler <kkb@breathsense.com>
> Subject: tuning accuracy [was: The Holy Grail temperament]
>
> on 6/3/03 12:47 AM, Jon Szanto <JSZANTO@ADNC.COM> wrote:
>
>> I include the following from John Loffinks >> microtonal-synthesis website:
>>
>> "Most synthesizers are limited in resolution to 1 to 2 cents >> for pitch.

Keep in mind that is is due to their implementation of technology, *not* because they couldn't have 10 times the accuracy if the manufacturers wanted to.

> Regarding this issue, I seem to recall reading (but can not find the
> reference) that 1 to 2 cents is considered about the best that > is achievable
> when tuning organs. And an organ tuner who is here with me > today says that
> practical tunings may often be off by a few cents and still be > considered
> "in tune", that you would drive yourself crazy as a tuner truing to do
> better. This sheds a slightly different light on the limitations of
> electronic instruments, making even crude synthesizer > technology look pretty
> good!

But it does not justify an unnecessary compromise.

Shouldn't the more appropriate question, in so far as we're considered with the present and future as much as the past (arguably more), be, 'can we build a better organ' ?

Cheers,
- Joel Rodrigues

Joel,

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Joel Rodrigues <jdrodrigues@P...> wrote:
> Keep in mind that is is due to their implementation of
> technology, *not* because they couldn't have 10 times the
> accuracy if the manufacturers wanted to.

Well, duh!

> But it does not justify an unnecessary compromise.

No. Market forces justify compromise. Until and unless there is a compelling reason to include better tuning resolution (i.e. "there will be a large market for these new models") it will simply not happen.

> Shouldn't the more appropriate question, in so far as we're
> considered with the present and future as much as the past
> (arguably more), be, 'can we build a better organ' ?

Seems like I get spam about that every day. Or was that "bigger"...?

Cheers,
Jon

on 6/5/03 6:41 AM, Joel Rodrigues <jdrodrigues@Phreaker.net> wrote:

> On Thursday, June 5, 2003, at 04:37 , tuning@yahoogroups.com wrote:
>
>> Kurt Bigler <kkb@breathsense.com>
>> Subject: tuning accuracy [was: The Holy Grail temperament]
>>
>> on 6/3/03 12:47 AM, Jon Szanto <JSZANTO@ADNC.COM> wrote:
>>
>>> I include the following from John Loffinks
>>> microtonal-synthesis website:
>>>
>>> "Most synthesizers are limited in resolution to 1 to 2 cents
>>> for pitch.
>
> Keep in mind that is is due to their implementation of
> technology, *not* because they couldn't have 10 times the
> accuracy if the manufacturers wanted to.

In my case, when I wanted more accurate pitches in my first piece of
synthesis software, I was up against a certain wall that was defined by how
I was using 32-bit integers for the wavetable phase. It would have been a
big deal to do better. I don't know about anyone else's implementations,
but one can't assume in advance that the limitation is simply "unnecessary",
with unnecessary being defined as "trivial to eliminate". It might be
considerably less than trivial to change.

The big problem as I see it is that there is no effective dialog with the
manufacturers. From out here we can never find out whether the problem we
perceive is for a good reason or not. (Yes, I know this is off-topic.)
Dialog and understanding are just not in vogue.

>> Regarding this issue, I seem to recall reading (but can not find the
>> reference) that 1 to 2 cents is considered about the best that
>> is achievable
>> when tuning organs. And an organ tuner who is here with me
>> today says that
>> practical tunings may often be off by a few cents and still be
>> considered
>> "in tune", that you would drive yourself crazy as a tuner truing to do
>> better. This sheds a slightly different light on the limitations of
>> electronic instruments, making even crude synthesizer
>> technology look pretty
>> good!
>
> But it does not justify an unnecessary compromise.
>
> Shouldn't the more appropriate question, in so far as we're
> considered with the present and future as much as the past
> (arguably more), be, 'can we build a better organ' ?

A good question. Unfortunately it seems to be true that organ builders are
not really that much interested in innovation.

In my case another question is "can the organ be this small without having
issues that will compromise tunability". With pipes in close in proximity,
and in some cases close to the moving swell shutters, stable tuning (even at
a fixed temperature and humidity) is hard to achieve.

-Kurt

>
> Cheers,
> - Joel Rodrigues
>
>
>
>
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On Friday, June 6, 2003, at 03:30 , tuning@yahoogroups.com wrote:

> From: "Jon Szanto" <JSZANTO@ADNC.COM>
> Subject: Re: tuning accuracy
>
> Joel,
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Joel Rodrigues <jdrodrigues@P...> wrote:
>> Keep in mind that is is due to their implementation of
>> technology, *not* because they couldn't have 10 times the
>> accuracy if the manufacturers wanted to.
>
> Well, duh!

Yeah, you'd think this would be obvious wouldn't you ? Well want to bet the average musician who looks at these products doesn't think, 'maybe that's all the resolution that we could ever need', and/or, 'maybe this tuning table business is of no consequence/use anyway so maybe that's why the manufacturers/designers seem to pay so little attention to it' ?

>> But it does not justify an unnecessary compromise.
>
> No. Market forces justify compromise. Until and unless there is > a compelling reason to include better tuning resolution (i.e. > "there will be a large market for these new models") it will > simply not happen.

I was not talking about the corporations compromising.

I was talking about us, the musicians/consumers - we have options now. If Korg, Yamaha, Roland want to continue with their stunted products, we have the option of things like Reaktor & Max/MSP, etc.

Not that I agree with that bit about market forces. I'm more from the, 'if you build it they will come' school of thought. And these corporations are continuing to miss an opportunity. I have more elaborate thoughts on this, but they need further consideration before I do anything about it.

>> Shouldn't the more appropriate question, in so far as we're
>> considered with the present and future as much as the past
>> (arguably more), be, 'can we build a better organ' ?
>
> Seems like I get spam about that every day. Or was that "bigger"...?

LOL. I have that problem too. The spam ! I mean the spam, damn it !!!

> Cheers,
> Jon

Best,
Joel

Joel,

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Joel Rodrigues <jdrodrigues@P...> wrote:
> Yeah, you'd think this would be obvious wouldn't you ? Well want
> to bet the average musician who looks at these products doesn't
> think, 'maybe that's all the resolution that we could ever
> need', and/or, 'maybe this tuning table business is of no
> consequence/use anyway so maybe that's why the
> manufacturers/designers seem to pay so little attention to it' ?

No, as a matter of fact, I don't think that at all. I don't think that most musicians and/or consumers of these items (synths, etc) care one whit about tuning. I think we live in the (commercial) 12tet world.

I openly profess a lack of knowledge of the viability of non-Western markets, i.e. how big a market is there for alternate tunings in any number of Middle Eastern cultures? I know that there are some instruments made just for that market, but I don't know much about it and especially how big a piece of the pie it is.

But, outside of occasional use of microtones for 'cool sounds' or something, I really don't think most people would take the time to really work in microtones. And it is because they have no compelling reason to.

Go to a big rock/pop concert. Tell me they need microtones.

> I was talking about us, the musicians/consumers - we have
> options now. If Korg, Yamaha, Roland want to continue with their
> stunted products, we have the option of things like Reaktor &
> Max/MSP, etc.

We? *WE*?? You mean the dinky microtonal community?? I think these people will make inroads with softsynth people - I've watched it happen on MMM - because it is *so* much more cost-effective to debug and implement (and change!) a software feature over a corresponding hardware feature. But hard manufacturers will NOT commit resources if they are not going to get a return on their investment.

> Not that I agree with that bit about market forces. I'm more
> from the, 'if you build it they will come' school of thought.

How many people have bought Starrboards? Or Marimba Luminas? or any number of elegant and creative solutions to finding new ways to make music, only to find they can't make them cheap enough, or so very few people are truly interested in something _new_ as opposed to something that is just _flavor_of_the_month_.

I had a day to kill today in (of all places), Hollywood, CA. I spent the morning going to a half-dozen music stores to gather information about a project. This is one of the big homes of the recording industry. This is toy-land.

And there aren't microtonal keyboards on display, and there probably won't be. Unless - and it has been said around here, for a long time by a very few people - there is a compelling musical need for it.

Cheers,
Jon