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Doublereed Archive - Posting 000078.txt from 2003/12

From: "Lacy, Edwin" <el2@-----.edu>
Subj: RE: [DR-L] Tuning Trivia
Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2003 11:22:03 -0500

> I've never seen anyone using a tuning fork, personally. Electronic
tuners
> seem to be the preferred device.

All of you who are saying that you have never seen anyone using a tuning
fork to tune an orchestra are revealing something about yourselves -
that you are mere youngsters! ;-)

Compact electronic tuners are a relatively recent invention. My memory
is that they were the latest technological gadget in the music world of
the mid-1970's. Before that, most electronic tuners were of the
stroboscope type, and you needed a wheelbarrow to carry them around.
(Oops - I suppose many of our younger colleagues won't know what a
wheelbarrow is, either.)

When tuners did become small enough to carry around in one's briefcase,
they cost several hundred dollars. The $20 micro-mini tuners of today
are an even more recent marvel of modern technology.

Those of us who are, ummmm, over 39 years old, will remember well the
oboist striking the tuning fork on his/her knee and holding the base of
it in the right ear while playing the A tuning note for the orchestra.

There was an advantage for us musicians in those days before we could
haul out the tuner to settle intonation disputes and discrepancies - we
had to use our ears! And after all, for a musician, there is something
to be said for this practice.

Ed Lacy
University of Evansville