The Fluid Piano

[nancylebov]

An acoustic piano whose every note has a slider to tune it up or down a half tone. In case that isn't enough, there's also a harp included with fluid tuning.

It's got much more cultural flexibility than a standard piano, and it's got more possibilities for composition.

My dream version would have the keys on rockers so the pitch could be controlled with the same finger that's making the note, but I'm not sure if that's possible. In any case, the fluid piano sounds like a wonderful advance.

Comments

[madfilkentist]

It's still going to have 12 notes per octave and no more, and as the article notes, it will take a lot of relearning. It makes more sense to me to play music with non-western tunings on non-western instruments.

[siderea]

Seconded.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Back before Bach and other folks developed the "well-tempered" tuning, some harpsichords were made with split black keys that would be able to play slightly different notes for sharps and flats. We in the West have gotten used to it, but our standard scale is actually slightly out of tune. Our sense of harmony, as Pythagoras noted, is based on exact integral ratios -- however, no matter what you do, you can't, quite, get twelve notes out of 3/2 ratios. You always end up with one note that's just wrong. So, instead, all of our notes on the Western scale are just a tiny bit out of tune, in an amount that ought to be just about imperceptible, but which leaves no notes being horribly out.

Before well-temperament, people would just leave one interval as a "wolf", and play in keys that avoided whatever interval was out.

What I see with this is that you could start doing perfect tunings again, because you could re-tune the piano to play in whatever key you needed, and avoid the wolf for whatever key it was.

[madfilkentist]

That can be, and is, done with existing instruments in some performances of early music. I think tuning the strings would let it stay in tune better than tuning levers would.

I once went to a Boston Symphony concert and heard a modern piece that specified just intonation. Only instruments with easily adjustable note pitches were included; I recall strings and trombones. Even to my ear, which isn't trained to just intonation, it had a somehow cleaner sound than the usual equal temperament.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've heard just intonation recordings, and it's obviously . . . "better", somehow. Sure, tuning the strings would give a better result than tuning levers, but you can only do just intonation for one set of key signatures at a time. This would allow you to play in any key, in just intonation, without spending an afternoon with a piano tuner to change it.

[madfilkentist]

Now all we need is an electronic tuner that can be programmed for just intonation in any key. There must be such things, though a quick Web search doesn't turn one up. It could be done in software; the math is actually easier than for equal temperament.

And actually, if you're doing pre-equal temperament music, you don't need to be able to tune to all keys. They just wouldn't have written to F-sharp major, because it would have sounded bad.

[siderea]

I have a Korg orchestral tuner which does a variety of historical temperaments; I'm using a mean-tone tuning for my 16th century harp work. This is not the model I have but it does have some unspecified variety of historical temperaments. The one I got cost me about $100 from von Huene's.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

What surprises me is that there aren't keyboards that can do this automatically. As you say, the math is actually easier -- so why not have an electronic keyboard that does it?

In order to do pre-equal temperament music, you wouldn't have to tune to F#maj, sure -- but what if you want to write a NEW piece in F#maj in just intonation?

[xanath.livejournal.com]

I'm speechless. What a great advance for the piano! What musician wouldn't want an instrument you could tune to a different mode?

I would actually love to see a freestanding harp with fluid tuning, but I have no idea how that would work. :(

[siderea]

...

All harps have "fluid tuning". Personally, I'd rather prefer that mine stop sloshing.

[xanath.livejournal.com]

::snort::

Something's wrong with mine, then. It just snaps, one string at a time.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Would you set the tones in advance of playing a piece, or would you adjust as you were playing, I wonder?

The instrument is beautiful; the sound is very like a harpsichord.

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Both are possible, so I suppose it depends on what you're trying to do.

[chicgomlbour.livejournal.com]

Oh! Wow! This is soooo cool! Every serious pianist should have one. ... and the best thing is, I don't have to call on the piano tuner to check on my piano every six months. Is this on the market already? Thanks for this post. piano teacher (http://www.tutormelbourne.com.au/music/piano-teacher-lessons)