Well I'm impressed by how much time was spent on this argument. My only comment is that I think Beethoven considered many of his Sonatas orchestrally, a place where temperament has little meaning. Moreover, since Beethoven had perfect pitch, a change in keys carried its own meaning and probably didn't need that added "character" created by WT. But I don't really have that much invested in this argument. If you prefer WT then by all means use it. I just tuned a WT the other day for a customer who prefers it. I made no disparaging remarks, nor did I try to convince her of the merits of ET. We will never really know if Beethoven chose certain keys because of the temperaments of his day. He didn't write about it, at least to my knowledge. He does, however, cite the characteristics of different keys. Perhaps it is no coincidence that, for example, certain Pastoral pieces are written in F and D--non key board pieces included. I have talked with many artists (pianists and non pianists) with perfect pitch and many report that certain keys have certain characters. They, to my knowledge, are not responding to WT's. I think that to take a piece such as Opus 90, and after the fact make an argument about how WT works and use that as a basis for arguing that that was the motivation for choosing the key is not in keeping with the scientific method. Pulling out my quote about "a waste of time" misses the point of the comment (which I agree I may not have clearly stated). The comment had to do with arguing about which is "better", ET or WT. It is a subjective argument which will have as many answers are there are tastes. Good luck with your quest , I personally think this discussion has been exhausted. David Love ----- Original Message ----- From: <A440A@AOL.COM> To: <pianotech@ptg.org> Sent: December 09, 2001 1:52 PM Subject: Temperament, A pianist responds > Greetings, > Certainly no one thought that the temperament discussion was over, did > they? Well, buckle the belts, hide the kids, question beliefs, and for the > uninterested, please delete, now. > > I must disagree with David's posting of last month: to wit > (snips to focus on Beethoven) > >>The arbitrary choice is that C is more tranquil than F#. In Beethoven's > Op.90, in >the second movement when the piece moves to a very tranquil E > major, in normal >WT a fairly "active" key, it would benefit from a quieter > key. In all honesty, I don't >think Beethoven was thinking of different > temperaments when he wrote that, >though I can't, of course, know for sure. > > Thus the choice of using a WT that creates more activity in E major seems > to be >imposing a personal taste in tuning that is not appropriate to the > piece. I am sure >there are also pieces where the revcerse could be argued. > To try and argue the >superiority of WT over ET and that WT has more color > and therefore is more >interesting, musical, dynamic, multi-dimensional, etc. > is a meaningless waste of >time.<< > > Since David cited specific passages, I sought the response of a pianist > by forwarding this post to Enid Katahn, (the pianist that has played on the > temperament CD's). I shall post her comments below in "quotation marks", but > first, to address one thing, when David writes: > > >>"The arbitrary choice is that C is more tranquil than F#". << > > Not arbitrary at all, but a logical and widely accepted way to temper > prior to 1900. This basic arrangement stayed constant from Weckmeister to > Braid-White. In this tuning that evolved out of refined meantone philosophy > and the Holder bearing plan, C would always have been more "tranquil" than > F#. > Since virtually everyone who published temperaments and how to create > them in the years between 1700 and 1850 obeyed this same order to the keys, > I think it plausible to assume that all pre-1880 composers were familiar with > how the "colors" progressed in keyboard tuning and illogical to think that the > greatest composer of the era would be oblivious to these characteristic > differences between keys. > So, back to the original post by Dave: > > >>There are some pieces where you could argue that a reverse of that system > would be better; for example, Beethoven's op. 90. The opening in > Em(relative of G major) which is filled with tension might benefit from a > reverse WT. > > To which Enid repsonds; > "Not true. Just because a key is more dissonant than Cmaj. doesn't > neccessarily mean it isn't peaceful. There is a difference between dissonance > as harshness and dissonance as emotionality, or expressiveness". In this > piece, Beethoven was looking for keys with more expression. As he goes > through, there are places where he creates a lot more contrast than he would > have in a more consonant key, such as C major." > > Several examples: > > bar 9: Beginning in a Gmaj, this passage moves downward, finally passing > through Cmaj before ending on a B triad. So, LVB places the most consonant > chord on the keyboard immediately before one of the most highly tempered. On > a WT , this juxtaposition creates a great harmonic contrast. The > pianist/historian's perspective on this is " This extreme contrast may be > read as LvB's way of letting us know that there is something going on under > the surface and it is not all as peaceful as you might think". (If LVB did > write this piece for his sponsor Baron Lichnowsky and his wife , it could be > making a musical referrence to the stormy marriage that they hid below the > verneer of civility in public. Beethoven is known for this sort of > stuff..Call the musicologists!!.) > > However, what if Beethoven had written Op. 90 in C? > "If op. 90 had been composed in the "more consonant" key of C, Bar 9 would > have moved from from G to C, causing a change in how the passage works, > especially the last two chords. In the original key, the final modulation > from C to B creates a particularly strong musical resolution of this passage, > a resolution suggesting something mysterious. Had the sonata been in C, the > move from F to E would not be as dramatic. Instead, the passage would end > with two chords more similar to one another instead of its original very > "expressive" chord played against a background of maximum consonance." > In view of the above, when David writes "to argue that WT has more color > and therefore is more interesting, musical, dynamic, > multi-dimensional,<snip>is a waste of time". , I must disagree for the > following reason, among others: > In WT this modulation changes not only the pitch of the interval, but > also the beating, or "color', whereas in ET, only the pitch changes. Since > more happens when you drop 100 cents while changing from a 7 cent to a 19 > cent third than when you simply drop everything 100 cents and the ratios stay > the same, I consider the WT to be more "multi-dimensional" and dynamic than > ET. The WT modulation is certainly more complex, even in the simplest > physical terms. > I would suggest that harmonic contrast, used in the above example, works > to enhance the expressive intentions of this music. (this is in the opening > bars, where we normally expect to find the musical expectations and hints of > things to come to be laid out). The choice of key determines the degrees of > contrast in the passages and I don't think Beethoven left those to anything > arbitrary. > > > Example 2: second mvt. going into bar 32, > The original choice for this passage in C#minor, a very colorful, > expressive key in WT. Enid writes: > " had Beethoven written op 90 in C, this would place this passage in Am, > which defeats the whole purpose. Am is a pleasant, peaceful sound, all the > way through, but this passage is supposed to be full of emotion". Played in > the key of Am on a Young temperament, the passage sounded lifeless to the > several listeners present. > > Example 3: The passage beginning at 115. > Here, Beethoven goes from one extreme of consonance to the other, and does > it in a very refined fashion. Starting in C, he moves through Cm, C#min, > C#, Emaj, E7, then crashing B's resolving to E. In a WT, these modulations > create a steady rise in the amount of tension leading up to the climatic B, > from which, in the final move to E, creates a strong resolution. A > masterful example of using progressively increasing tempering as the passage > develops, arriving at a point of maximum "expression" (B) just before the > final resolution (to E). The emotionality or expression of the piece is > heightened by this coherent, organized increase. > However, > If the sonata were in C, this progression would have begun in Ab! > Hardly a consonant pleasant beginning, and a place from which it will be > difficult to increase tension. That is a very intense key to begin a passage > such as this! Where is there to go?? > Had Op.90 been composed in the "more consonant" Key of C, the movement > would travel through: > Ab, Abm , Am, A, C C7 G then ending on C. So, the passage > would have had the softening of the tempering going against the rise of > musical tension plus that odd return to consonance in the middle A to C move. > Also, the climatic, expressive chord would not be the original's heavily > tempered B, but rather, a usually dulcet G. This would be an odd use of > temperament and wouldn't be supportive of the musical direction the passage > exhibits. > All in all, Enid Katahn feels like Beethoven knew exactly what he was > doing. The "color" effects created in a WT consistantly work with the > musical direction of his music. This is to be expected, since,as she points > out, composers didn't just start with the first note and go through to the > end, but rather, they had distinct musical moments that they would go about > linking together, figuring out how to get from here to there,etc. In > anything but ET, the choice of key is a fundamental component of how the > harmony functionswith the musical direction. > One mistake that is often made is to equate dissonance with bad, > consonance with good. This totally sidesteps the musical qualities of > contrast. We know that there are physical reactions to the various levels of > temperament, and the music certainly seems to support their use in consistant > ways. It would be a shame if Beethoven used these musical qualities and we > missed them, entirely, because of our allegiance to a status quo. > I, and others that have delved into it, are finding that these qualities > are very attractive to pianists. Yes, they can be cast in a crude and > counterproductive light as "out of tune", but I suggest that comes from a > musically limiting viewpoint. Drawing the curtains before seeing the play is > no way to find out what the story really is. There is nothing magical > about a 13.7 cent third. Restricting oneself to a single temperament, for > life, a person should have an extremely good reason to do so, and such a > decision should be as informed as possible. > Physically, there is more complexity in a well-temperament than an > equal one, and music performed on a WT is de facto more harmonically complex. > If the variety appeared random, one could question why a composer was > writing seemingly irrespective of the keys' characters, however, key usage > isn't random or arbitrary. > In a passage by passage examination, this complexity often appears to > be an intention of composers such as Beethoven. The effects are not easily > measured, except by direct comparison, as in side by side listening to a WT > and a ET. This has been done in the past and I believe the results usually > favor the non-ET tuning. > What's are these differences worth? That depends on how we use them. What > is a "meaningless waste of time" to one person is a path to a deeper > understanding of music for others. I don't think a musical genius like > Beethoven was composing piano music in ignorance of the way the keys sounded, > and the preponderance of evidence points to WT being the standard of his day. > > So when David decries "imposing a personal taste in tuning that is not > appropriate to the piece", I must respond that I see the use of 20th century > tuning for 18th and 19th century music as a far more dramatic example of > imposing personal tastes, and that any almost any form of WT would provide > less of an imposition. > > Regards, > Ed Foote RPT > (Stay tuned for more. I've some modern reasons too! ) >
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