Stretch: Yam vs Steinway

Does anyone know if Yamahas tend to have larger stretch and Steinways?? C. C. Chang

Funnily enough, today I played both a Steinway D and a Yamaha CFIIIS, and I feel that the Steinway has thinner keys, therefore it probably does have a smaller stretch than you average Yamaha. I know that some 9ths I had to play (orch. part of the Shostakovich 2nd concerto, 1st movement) were easier when I had the Steinway and not the Yamaha. Or maybe I was just more warmed up. And with my easy 10th stretch, it wasn't too much of a prob to begin with. ~Rbgirl~ 'You think life is hard, try learning Gaspard de la Nuit!'

I'd be surprised if either of them would stretch. My Kawai is exactly the same size as when I bought it years ago.

This question falls into the same category as 'Which is faster Ford or Chevy?'

In general it is safe to say that Yamaha appears to be more consistent with the amount of stretch necessary from piano to piano, but beyond that, it does depend on the specific piano, the venue, the material, the taste of the tuner, the taste of the pianist and the phase of the moon.

Here are a few numbers from my books. I think all these pianos sound pretty good. First number is A6 second number is C8. Some curves are flat, some consistent, some hook drastically. Stretch in the middle can be high, at the top low, or vice versa.

Yam C7 - 5.78/24.42* Yam C5 - 7.37/30.78 Yam C3 - 6.77/26.52 Yam C2 - 7.02/28.61*

Steinway D - 11.2/40.1 Steinway D - 6.0/18.0 Steinway D - 13.34/19.6 Steinway B - 7.94/27.47 Steinway B - 13/40 Steinway A3 - 9.22/31.95 Steinway A2 - 8.72/33.58* Steinway O - 8.04/23.02* Steinway M - 7.17/24.62

* denotes exceptionally nice sounding SPECIFIC pianos.

Note to all 'physicists': These numbers are not sufficient data upon which to draw conclusions of any kind. Analyze at your own risk. It also appears the an apprentice could match my tunings pretty well by just stretching 6 at A6 and 28 at C8. Hey! Time to put that ad in the Yellow Pages and get your cards all printed up!

Frank Weston

I think he's probably asking about 'stretch' in relation to tuning. I'd be surprised if the key-to-key distance varied between Steinway and Yamaha.

By the way, my B stretches quite a bit across the living room.

- Darryl

I presume that '* denotes exceptionally nice sounding SPECIFIC pianos' is not meant in some kind of an absolute sense, but in a relative sense, i.e. a C2 compared to other C2's etc.

Oh. Whoops! ~Rbgirl~ Feeling silly

Thx to Frank W. for very interesting data, which really support every you (FW) say. So the av. stretch in your interval is 21 cents for yams and 19 for SS, with yams having very narrow distribution and SS having wild distribution, consistent with everything we know about Yams and SS. Yams have more stretch, but by a Bush margin. Also, quality of sound has almost nothing to do with stretch which has more to do with quality of tuning and scaling.

By the way, thanks to Clark, I found the explanation for what causes stretch in the literature, which I have inputted into my tuning section:
http://members.aol.com/chang8828/tuning.htm

look under What is stretch? in Chapt. Two.

By the way, the correct term is inharmonicity, not anharmonicity, so let's try to be consistent. I have made the same mistake and am in the process of correcting it in my write-ups. Anharmonic means anti-harmonic, whereas inharmonic means not harmonic. At least, that's the usage in JASA. C. C. Chang

averages of one string from 3 adjacent notes? C. C. Chang

CC,

When I posted, I cautioned readers against drawing conclusions from the information. From your previous note I can see that went right over your head (or through). Obsessing on the numbers is just going to get you into more trouble. Don't do it.

Many factors other than the name on the fallboard affect the stretch in a tuning. You don't know all the factors that influenced my numbers, and to be honest, neither do I.

Frank Weston