Coleman 11

[Doug Mahard]

Excellent post Ron, as insightful and witty as always.

Doug Mahard

>
> > "Pity", "more fun" and "forward" are all terms of arrogance and
presupposes
> >a superiority that exists only in the mind of the individual and their
terms
> >of acceptance or rejection of ideas/sounds be they ET vs HT or Ravel vs
> >Chopin.
> >My view. :-)
> >Jim Bryant (FL)
>
> I've got to agree with Jim here on all counts. If ET (one temperament) was
> the great entrenched mindless monolith it's made out to be, there wouldn't
> be so MUCH interest and traffic on the List about the apparently endless
> variations of, uh, alternative temperaments. All that traffic being, by my
> count, in spite of the vitriol and self induced emotional baggage.
> Enthusiasm is one thing, but claiming progress over something that isn't
> generally acknowledged to be broken is something else again. If the
> temperament variants were the long awaited answer to an acknowledged
> problem, or set of problems, they could reasonably be called a "better"
> approach. As it is, alternative temperaments are just another way to do
the
> same thing that ET does - to organize a tuning into some sort of rational
> system. None of the available temperaments is the enemy, just as none is
> the answer in all cases. Each may elicit a desired blend of glandular
> secretions and endorphins in the listening audience under specific
> circumstances, without necessarily being the ultimate end-all for any
> occasion. Nearly anything new, different, unfamiliar, or exotic, will
> always draw the momentary attention of a number of people. A certain
> percentage will find something that speaks to them in this latest
iteration
> of change and embrace it wholeheartedly. Others won't be all that
> interested, and still others, as well as some from each of the first two
> groups, will chase off in full cry after the next "New Thing" that
> supercedes it. The historical temperaments were each once the ET of their
> times - the entrenched monolith within their individual sphere of
> influence. Why is it that old approaches that were replaced by later
> iterations of "truth" and "currently in vogue" seem to achieve a patina of
> latent reverence when they are re-discovered? They didn't  necessarily die
> from a lack of validity in the first place did they? They were often just
> "fashioned" into oblivion and may still be as good as when they were put
on
> the shelf, but that doesn't make them the ANSWER. Resurrect anything you
> find to be valuable, by all means. Enjoy it and share it around as much as
> you like, but don't try to sell it as "new and improved". We've all seen
> too many instances of that kind of packaging already.
>
> Don't need a flame suit. I rely on scar tissue these days.
>
> Ron N
>