the blind piano tuner

jack sprinkle was a talented, blind piano technician that for years would tune our family’s small upright and make it sound like a grand. one day i played him thelonious monk’s ‘straight no chaser’ and asked him to help me get that thick smashing of chords while keeping the clarity of the high solo runs. his answer was simple: detune the whole middle range of notes.

while proceeding in what he considered wrecking the piano, he said: ‘i’ll leave the strings like this for 2 hours and come back. do what you have to do. by the way i hate monk.’ as he left for another job, i tracked this tune.