The Great Chicago Tune-Off (from 1997)
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I saw this on Facebook, it’s an article from a 1997 issue of the Piano Technicians Journal. They had two veteran tuners tune two side-by-side pianos, one aurally and one with an ETD, and then had listeners do a blind listening test. I would imagine there are more recent tests like this with more recent technology, but I thought this was a fun read nevertheless. It almost made me wonder if this magazine is still in publication (perhaps online?)
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Yup, it is still published, but only to Piano Technician Guild members. I dropped my membership years ago.
There have been a few "tune-offs" over the years - some between equal temperament and alternates and others between competing electronic tuning devices. (I hosted/ran one of those for the Chicago chapter years ago, using a number of Baldwin school upright pianos - notoriously difficult scale design for devices to calculate a decent tuning)
One note about the first tune-off: I studied a bit with Virgil Smith and I don't think he ever 'just' tuned a piano he didn't also spend time with the voicing.
