Sorry to jump in the middle of things as it were > > > The arguments that temperament influenced music as far as > > >history is concerned is coming to a rapid close. After each > > >tuning scheme is finally translated, it is seen by tuners, > > >musicians, musicologists, and music historians, that > temperament > > >doesn't really matter unless it produces wolves. > Really this is a flawed arguement. The claim it makes is purely a subjective opinion and has no real basis in fact, because the question about the ability of temperaments to influence music composition and/or experience has never been really explored thoroughly. The fact that you can put 10 high quality pianists in a room with 10 different temperaments and find that they can not really hear the difference when someone plays them doesnt really say very much. It is just as likely that those same 10 pianists would not be able to "hear" the beats pianotuners listen to. It is quite possible, if not downright likely that being temperment aware is for most an aquired attribute... learned as it were. Further no research outside of that from a few psychoacousticians who have dabbled in the area, has been done to see what unconcious affects temperements can have on our perceptions of musical tones and combinations. In short.. the question has never been seriously asked nor attempted to be seriously answered. There has been a lot of whoopla through the years, pointing to this passage or the other, or that quote from Mendelson, or the other from Baldini... but no one has ever really gone methodically forward to find out what is possible to begin with. The result is that we just plain dont know whether temperaments have influenced music history or not. Just my two quarters RicB -- Richard Brekne RPT, N.P.T.F. UiB, Bergen, Norway mailto:rbrekne@broadpark.no http://home.broadpark.no/~rbrekne/ricmain.html
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