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Tuning an instrument before playing, or singing “in-tune”, is extremely important if an artist is to hope that patrons will leave any performance satisfied. Even those with no musical training can tell that “something just doesn’t sound right” if the tuning is off.
In music circles, there is a phrase often uttered as musicians tune their instruments. “That’s close enough for jazz,” they say. There is debate as to how that phrase originated, but the most likely reason that I’ve come across is that particularly in the early days of jazz the instruments were often of poor quality, unable to play notes in tune through the entire range, as well as the fact that most musicians were self-taught and unaware of the importance of tuning. Close was good enough.