@ Congratulations
Yeah, The Tide is High, by The Paragons is the tune I had in mind.
I’ve heard at least two covers of that tune, but I wasn’t aware that Blondie covered it.
Thanks!
Oh, Toto!
Pay no attention to that man behind the screen…
The track is available on Proper Records 4 CD box set, Deep Ska
This is such interesting stuff you guys should start a thread on it instead of hijacking this one.
Cheers
Graeme
good luck with that Graeme…
I did make a possibly helpful suggestion regarding testing back on page one…
I will have you know that thread-hijacking is a C+F institution. 
And I’mma have to get that box set. It looks to be worth every penny.
I suspect thread-hijacking is as much a part of the tradition in ITM as playing a flute out of tune is.
Cheers
Graeme
this is C&F…you’ve got one called C+F 
Well, part of what I’m getting at is that the newer Mac computers are Intel based, and can do all of, and more than, what a PC can do, including the Mac OS X operating system, and, on separate installation, including any of the more recent Microsoft operating systems, including Windows and Vista.
That’s right, you can run Windows and Vista on a Mac, along with the Mac. Now, ain’t that something!
You could put Red Hat on a Mac, too, no problem, but the Mac OS simply doesn’t need Red Hat. Yup, it’s just that good.
Go Mac!
Um… yes.
Thread hijacking is, additionally, a C&F institution. Time-honored, even.
FIXT.
On topic, here.
Apparently this thread has to do with the tuning of a flute.
Any comments? And, is the messenger bullet-proofed, yet?
Not sure if I’m bullet proofed. I really do think this is quite useful - you need to be careful interpreting the results. Cork you’ve got a bunch of different flutes haven’t you? You must have noticed that the tuning varies quite a lot and some you can play “in tune” easier than others. Would you find this a useful tool to discover what was going on with each? Would you believe the results?
Cheers
Graeme
Congrats to Terry and Graeme! This program sounds really useful. I can see how luthiers and both noobie and advanced players would all fine it helpful.
Also, it sounds to me like you’ve already done the essential testing. It was almost a double-blind test since you didn’t know that you were using an out of tune source. Did Terry find subtle tuning issues in his playing or in different flutes? If Terry found it useful, that would convince me.
Maybe you could ask a few volunteers to send you tune samples for testing. Then test them independently. In other words, Terry can listen to the samples and judge them by ear. Then Graeme can run them through the program. Compare both sets of results to see if there are any major surprises or discrepancies.
The question the Mac thread-hijacking raised for me is whether this could be made easy for anyone to use. Is the current R script is Unix based only? Could it be made turned into Java or something that’s fairly universal?
It’s currently easy enough to use. I’ve done it under Windows. Both Tartini and R (with my script) should run under Windows, MacOSx, or Linux (with some work). I’ll write a front end for it sometime soon. Was going to go with Windows only initially, but I could write one in Java I suppose. But it’s not hard to use even now without the front end.
Terry’s just sent me a plot of a Nicholson flute - flat foot so flat it’s off the bottom of the graph - but that’s easily fixed.
Cheers
Graeme
Well, if it’s already platform independent that sounds very good!
(Note to Graeme: I was editing my first post while you were responding to it, so there is now another paragraph in that you may not have noticed.)
My testing so far has also included: playing my accordion, 1 reed, 2 reeds, fast, slow. Playing my high D whistle. Checking out a recording of the pipes vs just temperament in D. Altering a flutes tuning with changes to the bore and holes and testing it before and after…
Every test gives the results you’d expect. But more ideas for testing are welcome. Yes we could get some samples. Should we trust Terry’s ear! I don’t trust mine. The sort of sample I want is from someone who’s pretty sure they have an issue when playing a particular flute, and are pretty sure what it is. They send a sample but don’t tell me what they suspect or who made the flute.
We are not going to publish any results identifying flute maker or player if they are still alive, without their permission.
Cheers
Graeme
Well, apparently there are “cheap” flutes, which could be on the level of junk.
Beyond those, however, it seems that the flute “market” remains fairly competitive, such that makers of junk flutes are quickly discovered, and simply don’t last for long. Moreover, as far as I am aware, all of the flute makers here, on the C&F board, along with notable others, are makers of high quality flutes, and should I discover otherwise, I’d be glad to say so.
That said, given that current flutes appear to be well made, as above, current flutes tend to be fairly consistent in their tuning, and perhaps the greater differences between them could have more to do with whatever model they could be patterned after, where there appears to be a broad division between the R&R type flutes and the Pratten type flutes, for instance.
Yes, I fed my beautiful but stupid Nicholson small-hole 7-key into it and it told me just how stupid it was. This is an extraordinary flute where low D is about 80 cents flat, and middle D about -40cents. F#s are about -45 (all these with respect to A and B which are strangely like-minded in both octaves). Tartini-R picked up all those things and reported them correctly, except for the Low D, because currently we haven’t programmed it to show low C#. As I commented to Graeme, when a flute is this bad, you don’t need Tartini-R to be aware of it, but it illustrates Denny’s point about being able to detect and quantify known errors.
That was me just noodling around on the flute for about 2 minutes, not even bothering to warm it up. This is looking good.
So, what else can we throw at it?
Maybe you could test it by running through this amazing item:
http://www.sonicstate.com/news/shownews.cfm?newsid=6281
(after the ad, that is)
Kevin Krell
Hmmm, very good Graeme. I’ve been throwing a range of flutes against it, playing tunes, scales, noodling, and not seeing much difference. So it doesn’t seem to be very critical as to source material, suggesting that your processing is working pretty darn well. But I am seeing the tuning characteristics of the different flutes coming out, and with greater precision, reliability and ease compared with the time consuming approach I’ve taken in the past. It’s just great to spend 2 minutes playing, then press a few buttons and have a complete analysis of the tuning in front of you. Just what I wanted! Thank you!
Terry