gsmonks

When I direct a band I have two simple rules where electronic tuners are concerned: (1) Leave it at home! (2) I will stomp it into the floor if I catch you using it!


Why am I so much against the use of electronic tuners? Simple. You're not tuning when you use an electronic tuner. You're lining up numbers. Lining up numbers is not tuning. There is only one way to tune an instrument, and that is with your ear.

This modern-day addiction to electronic tuners is a mite vexing, in view of the fact that you have to explain to people why using a tuner is wrong-headed.

Am I right? Am I right? Rant, snort, wheeze!

bobd0

Accuracy would seem to be sacrificed somewhat for convenience. I mean, how accurate can millions of $10 electronic tuners be? I'm certain there are variables. There are always variables.




(But I must confess I use an electronic tuner on my guitar. But guitars are far more weird re: tuning than trumpets.)

Dale Proctor

I use an electronic tuner to evaluate the temperment of a horn sometimes, but I don't use one to tune. Tuning is dependent on the particular group you play with, and is dynamic as you play. Anyone attempting to play in tune while watching a tuner (and adjusting their pitch to it while playing) is bound to NOT be playing in tune with the group.

__________________


Olde Towne Brass
www.otbrass.com

Brass Band of Huntsville
www.brassbandofhuntsville.org

"Hit it hard and wish it well." - Claude Gordon

Schwab

Every professional I know has an electronic tuner. They have their place.

__________________
Dylan Schwab
Stage 1 New York

hose

I sometimes use mine to subtly prove to the person next to me in a community band that he really is a lot out of tune.

__________________
Lawler C7c
Besson International
Lawler Flugel
Bach C
Kanstul Cornet

Pedal C

They can be a useful tool, but not during a rehearsal. I think of it as a reality check, particularly for notes that I know I tend to play too high or low (skying a G on top of the staff, for example). Stuff thats way farther out than just the difference between in tune with a piano and in tune with a band. Say I play the first three notes of the Hindemith...then look at the tuner. Releaving to see that maybe I've played it 35 cents sharp! Then I play it again and try to hear where it really should be.

The problem with tuners (or drones, for that matter) is when people start out of tune and bend in tune. You're out of tune; the damage is done. The point is to learn where it is and hit it right on. I think the electronic tuner can help as a check, but not when it becomes a crutch.

Same goes for metronomes...the point isn't to play in time WITH it, it's to learn to play in time WITHOUT IT! But it's still a good tool.

__________________
"The oboe's A is to make sure we still play it 1 and 2" - Bud Herseth

"One way or another, every patient stops bleeding." - Scrubs

Grizzle

Unless the pitch center or the particular chord is different than your tuner, which it almost always has to be (because pitch is relative and constantly changing).

I agree with the original poster 1000%--the least in tune players I know use tuners during a rehearsal or worse, a concert. The logic is mind boggling--we tune with our ears, not our eyes. An E in a CM chord is very different than an E in an EM chord, and a tuner will never know this. If you don't know why this is so, you probably play out of tune and don't know that you do.

__________________
Instead of PM: gtp@bitstream.net
Quicker response to questions!

--Steve

Sofus

That´s true. An interresting experiment would be
to let a brass quintet play together with their ears
covered, playing chords together while only adjusting
the pitch of their notes by looking at one electronic
device each.

__________________
" There are no secrets to trumpetplaying - except Practice Your Head Off - and that´s no secret! "

Bud Herseth 1977 in Hamar, Norway


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Mouthpiece and Solidarity

nordlandstrompet

Trumpetplayers are too smart for their own good.

They are always trying to get the tuner in tune with themselves.

Therefore there should have been a law taht said:

Trumpetplayers are not allowed to look at the display of
an electronic tuner when tuning their instrument!

__________________
nordlands
roarmp.com

"When you play an Andante, people have to cry..." Maurice Andrè


Olds Recording
Yamaha 731S cornet
Conn V1 flugel

hose

I'm talking a lot out of tune. Not the subtleties of pitches within the chords.

__________________
Lawler C7c
Besson International
Lawler Flugel
Bach C
Kanstul Cornet