HT wine-tasting (was HT tests)

[A440A@aol.com]

Bob writes; 
<<  You could remove the performer as a factor by using one of the 
high-end automated player systems to do the performance for recording.  >>

Greetings, 
     This idea brings up another consideration, and I think it is critical.   
The inequality of tempering is only a resource, and the final product that we 
hear is basically the pianists' use of the resources available. That means a 
pianist will interpret the music differently, depending on the response of 
the instrument, and changing the temperament most definitely changes the 
response of the piano.  Using a mechanical reproduction will erase this.  It 
might make the comparison more "scientific", but will have little validity in 
determining musical "value", since the value of WT's is tremendously 
dependant on the pianists ability to use the added complexity of the 
inequality.  It may also be the reason that a listener who cannot detect the 
difference between ET and WT is unable to realize the added value of other 
tunings.   
   For this reason, my investigation and decisions regarding the temperaments 
has relied on the response of the performers, (and to some degree, listeners) 
 rather than the theoretical pros and cons found in the technical 
community.,(yes, that is a pun). 
   I gave the example of two remote key compositions for demonstrating the 
use of highly tempered keys, last week.  In response, it was posted that 
these didn't illuminate the character of the keys because they were,if I 
remember correctly,  in the words of the poster, "lyrical".  The mood of the 
piece doesn't DEPEND on the amount of tempering, it depends on how the 
pianist plays it.  Or, in other words, (Enid Katahn's words),  "The pianist 
can chose to play it dissonantly or expressively".  
    It is her, and others contention, that composers chose the keys that they 
did for harmonic reasons, and their writing took advantage of the resources 
found in the various keys.  It was not as simple as pure thirds for this, and 
tempered thirds for that.  The WT's are more complex than ET because they 
have a variety of harmonic values, they are not a homogenized set.   The 
opposition of the fifths and thirds makes analysis of why a key was chosen 
dependant on the composer's intention, ie, there is a difference between a 
passage of pure melodic intervals juxtaposed over a highly tempered harmony 
and one in which the melodic line makes use of "expressive" melodic intervals 
played against a very consonant harmony. How things are 
voiced,(pianistically, not by needles), is heavily influenced by the 
pianist's taste, and this is lost when a reproducer mechanism is playing. 
    It is natural that we, of 20th century persuasion, want to test all 
things in a scientific manner, however, emotional and musical expression 
often resides in a spiritual realm, where science is forbidden to go. 
Regards, 
Ed Foote RPT 
www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/
www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html