Tuning - Lots of it

WARNING! This is a long screed, so if you'd rather not read the whole thing, skip to the last section. 

Hey! There is no such thing as a clarinet whose notes are all perfectly in tune, so quit insisting on it. Your job is not to pin every note on the clarinet to 0% out of tune because it can't be done and it's not necessary. 

Anyway, "in-tune" is not defined by the needle on your tuner, but the notes you're playing in the context of the piece your playing, the listeners' perception, and on the tuning of any other instrument or ensemble you're playing with.

Repeat: "In-tune" is not defined by the needle on your tuner, it's defined by the ears and brain of the listener. 

How people "hear" tuning, and what is tolerable

A very sophisticated, very critical ear and detect plus or minus about 5% variance from a note's perfect tuning. An "average" non-musical person will accept wider variances  as in-tune.

• People generally tolerate sharper pitches more than flatter pitches.

• People generally are more sensitive to out-of-tune notes in the low register.

• Tuning tolerance is directly related to the length of the note. An out of tune note in a faster passage usually isn't noticed unless it's over 20% sharp or 20% flat. Long notes are generally tolerated if within 5% sharp or 10% flat.

Ain't no electronics involved.

If you can't resist looking at your tuner all the time, throw it away!

If you're adjust your pitch according to a tuner as you are playing in an ensemble, stop it! What your tuner tells you doesn't matter, it's what your ears and your brain tell you about the pitches around you.

Electronic tuners are only good for:

• Determining the general tendency of an instrument to play high or low, either across the ranges or within a range.

• Determining if there are any outliers that need to be dealt with, especially in the altissimo register.

• Determine a "ballpark" pitch before subsequently tuning to other instruments.

Checking the tuning of your setup with an electronic tuner

If you're tuning a note in a passage, approach the note you want to tune from the notes before it, don't just sound the note "by itself".  Let the pitch settle in, THEN look at the tuner, not before.

It doesn't make any difference if you pin your notes at 440 or whatever pitch you have set on your tuner. Tune to the ensemble. If you have to, use your tuner to get near where you want to be, but after that, PUT IT AWAY. It does your ensemble no good at all if you're absolutely right, but you're not in tune with the rest of the people

Here is a chart of the tuning of one of my clarinets tuned to the C below the staff (the blue cell C row).:

My entries represent the percent a note varies from being in tune with the C, + being sharp, - being flat. The ST column are the tuning for the standard fingering. The RES/ALT column notations are the tunings for resonant or alternate fingerings. 

Note that all but two pitches, the altissimo F# and the throat A, are within the "acceptable" range of listener tolerance, but an alternate fingering make brings the pitch into tolerance. (I wrote the wrong key name on the chart; it's actually the LH or RH pinky F#/C#.)

Also note that the clarion C pushes the limits of tolerance.

What good is the chart?

The chart is good for three things: 

• Identifying "outliers" -- individual notes that vary widely from what is acceptable.

• Identifying the tuning characteristics of a particular setup and especially identifying notes that could be brought better in tune with mechanical adjustments or alternate fingerings.

• Identifying tuning tendencies or your setup through the range.

Keep in mind that messing with tuning charts isn't a thing you want to do often. The purpose of the chart is to identify the tuning characteristics of your setup. 

How to fix tuning

• For outliers, try to find alternate fingerings that are better in tune...if there are any...or try to tune the notes mechanically (see below).

• If you're playing with an ensemble and you're consistently out of tune, pull out or push in joints (see below).

• If you're playing with an ensemble, if there's a single note that's out of tune and you don't have a good alternate fingering, lip it up or down. 

• For individual outliers, especially in the chalumeau register, try these fixes that you can do yourself, especially for notes in the throat register.:

  • Adjusting pad heights ("venting")

  • Building up tone holes

  • Changing barrels

I'll write about them in detail in a future article

Good practices

• Thoroughly warm up your instrument before tuning. A cold instrument will produce flat pitches.

• Tune C below the staff, not the C an octave higher, as is common practice. The higher C will be out of tune with the rest of the clarinet because of the design of clarinets, which has to compromise between and in-tune low F and the C a twelfth above. (Notice that, on my chart, there's a 20% difference between these two notes, and C is 14% sharp. 

• When tuning with an ensemble, tune and then stop playing. Don't keep honking on your horn or warming up while others are trying to tune.

• Tune the open G with the barrel, then tune the lower C by pulling out or pushing in the lower joint. Compromise between the two if necessary. (In rare situations, you might want to tune the low E by pulling out the bell, but isn't often required.

This is a jumble, but it'll have to do for now.

Cheers!