[TimR]

On Thursday, May 23, 2019 at 10:27:03 PM UTC-4, Phil Allison wrote:
geoff wrote:




Nobody uses tuning fork anymore? The battery lasts forever.


I've got one. Somewhere. Changes pitch with temperature.



** How silly, so does everything.

Tuning forks are very stable, used in Boliva watches and older guitar tuners from Roland.



.... Phil

Which brings up another question: how stable are the cheap ubiquitous electronic tuners? Every musician I know has one, they run less than $20 (and I recall the Stroboconn being about $1200 back when that would buy a nice car.)

They are a good thing as well as an annoyance. You get the occasional player who ignores the group and plays out of tune, insisting he's the only one correct, based on his tuner. But I recall the days when you never knew what pitch a group would be playing at, and had to be prepared to move at least a quarter tone up or down on the fly, sometimes more. The availability of cheap tuners means every group I play with is at least close to A440.