The idea that "traditional musicians don't use concert pitch" is a bucket of idiot-drool. Maybe he didn't want anybody playing along with him, which, at times, is understandable—but if true, why didn't he just say so? Where is it written that "traditional musicians don't use concert pitch?" First of all, since when is this bozo a traditional musician? Sounds like he's trying to act "folkier than thou."

There is any number of practical reasons for using concert pitch. First of all, there are the fixed-pitch instruments—those whose pitch can't be changed, or, like a piano (or autoharp), would require a major effort to retune. Good quality fixed-pitch instruments are set at the 440=A (the international standard), for the simple reason that no professional musician, such as a clarinetist or flautist, is going to buy an instrument, no matter how good, that can't be played in tune with other instruments. [Musicians who play in Baroque or Early Music ensembles often use a different standard, but it is an agreed-upon standard.]

Variable pitch instruments, such as strings (violins, violas, cellos, harps, guitars, etc.)—especially good, concert-quality ones—are built with a particular string tension in mind, and they're a whole lot happier if you let the soundboard get used to that tension, and keep it there consistently. A new instrument "opens up" a lot better and a lot faster if you tune it to concert pitch and don't keep cranking it up and down. I've been told this by a couple of luthiers. Also, I own a couple of top quality Spanish-made guitars, I keep them at concert pitch, and they just keep getting better with time and playing.

Another practical reason to tune to a standard is that if everyone uses the same standard (and since most tuning forks come in 440=A, electronic tuners use 440=A as the default, and almost all fixed-pitch instruments are set at 440=A, what easier standard can their be?) is that if you and everybody else tunes your guitar, banjo, mandolin, of what-have-you is tuned to this standard before going to a session, you'll spend less time in the "tuning-up ritual" and can spend more time making music.

Kinda stupid not to. I really fail to understand the mentality of folkies (and they're generally the only ones who do this) who would rather commit suicide than abide by any of the same standards that other musicians abide by. These standards allow musicians to communicate and to work together—if they so choose. Not to do so is self-defeating. Sort of like "Rebel without a Brain."

Of course, if he really is a traditional musician and all he wants to do is sit on the front stoop, play his $10.00 Sears Roebuck guitar, and sing to the raccoons lurking in the underbrush, then it won't matter much how he tunes his guitar—or even if.

Don Firth