Editor's Note: Alan Werner has kindly sent along this report on his work with electronic tuners as described in the March 18 Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. I am pleased to reprint the article here.
A battery-operated tuner for orchestras and individual performers could be called the revenge of the oboist.
And the true "A" sounded by the new pocket-size tuner may be the last sound in an argument that's gone on for centuries.
The tuner, manufactured and marketed by Monroe Electronics Inc. of Lyndonville, Orleans County, was developed by Alan Werner, an electronics engineer who is an oboist with the University Symphony Orchestra in Rochester. His quartz crystal-controlled electronic tuner is battery operated and about the size of a pack of cigarettes. Currently, most electronic tuners are as big as cigar boxes and must be plugged into electrical outlets.
The "Pocket Pitch," which strikes a true A, or another instrument that strikes B flat, retail for about $49.
But the pocket-sized tuner was not developed in the interest of science. "It's a private vendetta," said engineer-oboist Alan Werner.
"The oboe is responsible for giving the 'A' while the orchestra tunes; there's a traditional fight over that note," said Isaiah Jackson, assistant conductor for the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra.
The string, wind and brass sections have a vested interest in how sharp that A is played. "The strings like to play sharp because it makes them sound brilliant," Jackson said. "But the winds are manufactured to play at a certain pitch. To play sharp they have to press harder. And it gets to the point where they can't play any sharper."
And there's further disagreement within the wind section, Jackson said. "The oboes like to play low but the clarinets like to play high. In my first orchestra a clarinet quit because he couldn't come to terms with the oboist over the pitch."
Engineer-oboist, Alan Werner, who developed the small tuner, says the brass section often claims his A is too sharp. And only the bassoonists are sympathetic, he says.
At times the disagreement is warranted, Jackson said. "Heat, humidity, what you had for breakfast and how strong the coffee is can affect pitch," he said.
A wind section sometimes complains that the note it gets from an oboist isn't the same note he gave the string section. "And in amateur orchestras, it may not be," Jackson said.
"When you have this kind of fighting you can see there's a great need for objectivity."
Within the Rochester Philharmonic, that objectivity has come from first oboist Robert Sprenkle, professor of oboe at the Eastman School of Music. About 40 years ago Sprenkle attached a tuning fork to a small amplifier and put it in a cigar box for use by the Philharmonic, Werner said.
Since that time, technology has advanced, Werner said. The greatest advance for the tuner was the watch technology that produced the quartz crystal. The crystal plus CMOS integrated circuitry allows the tuner to be pocket-sized, he said.
Although electronic tuners are catching on nationally, they are taking a long while to be accepted. Sprenkle said. "Some feel it's a weakness to use a machine-that the rest of the orchestra may have a lack of faith in you as an oboist. On the contrary, it puts an obligation on each person in the orchestra."
Orchestra members who realize there is some variation in the pitch given by an oboist may take the liberty of "interpreting" the pitch to their own advantage, he said. The electronic tuner lessens the need for extensive interpretation .
