(careful, it is about temperaments)

[David Love]

I wasn't aware that there had been 2 centuries of arguing pros and cons.
I'd be curious about statements from composers to that specific issue, if
there are any.  It seems if there were such statements that the question
would have been answered as to what drove them.  I do know that temperaments
developed toward ET consistently until it was finally achieved.  I don't
know of any statements by any composers lamenting the loss of their beloved
WT or wolf tones.  

I do recall an interesting discussion by a pianist customer of mine who has
perfect pitch.  She does, by the way, favor ET.  The WT's simply sound out
of tune to her.  She commented that she often wondered what people without
perfect pitch heard because the shift in keys within a piece was so obvious
to her and the character of the piece changed so much with those shifts due
to her innate awareness and response to the characteristics of individual
keys.  The farther from the tonic the piece moved, the greater the tension
due to the remoteness of the new key and its own particular characteristics,
not because of a change in the effective tuning style.  Though, she
commented, people with a highly trained sense of relative pitch would be
able to follow the shifts in key, she wondered if the reaction to those
shifts wasn't more intellectual than visceral, as it was with her.  The
varying "color" of the keys occurred naturally as a function of her innate
abilities are perceptions.  Though I mentioned this before, it seems like
the selection of keys in pieces had much more to do primarily with that and
may have been influenced or limited by some other factors particular to the
piano.  Interestingly, the resurgence in WT seems like it does offer those
without perfect pitch a sort of quasi experience with it.  The different
nature of the keys driven by the temperament allows the person without
perfect pitch to experience something that a person with perfect pitch might
without artificial manipulation. 

Key choices of various composers were probably driven by a variety of
factors.  In Beethoven's Opus 2#3 in C, the choice of keys may have been
driven by the pianistic requirements of the right hand especially in the
opening of the final movement which would be quite difficult in a key with
any sharps and flats.  The generally agitated character of the opening
movement doesn't argue for a choice of the key of C if the characterizations
ascribed to that key hold true as a motivating factor.  Chopin's selection
of keys was certainly driven by pianistic considerations (btw I don't think
he possessed perfect pitch, but I might be wrong).  He writes that he always
started his students out with scales in the key of B because it fell most
naturally under the hand.  The predominance of pieces in 4 and 5 flats in
his work was certainly a function of what he considered important--a natural
and relaxed hand.  The key of C, he wrote, was the most difficult and
unnatural.  Not surprising that very few (if any) pieces are written in that
key. 

While I think the exploration of WT has it's own interest in terms of what
the composers of that day may have been hearing when they actually played
their works on the piano or related instrument, I think it is far from
conclusive that those who often conceived of and composed things away from
the instrument, with a keen sense of absolute pitch and the unique
characteristics of each key apart from the piano, with orchestration ever in
their minds would have been driven by tuning style that was evolving even
during their own lifetimes.         

David Love
davidlovepianos@comcast.net 

-----Original Message-----
From: pianotech-bounces@ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org] On Behalf
Of Ric Brekne
Sent: Wednesday, January 11, 2006 8:08 AM
To: pianotech
Subject: (careful, it is about temperaments)

Please show me the "evidence".  

David Love
davidlovepianos@comcast.net <mailto:davidlovepianos@comcast.net> 



Seems to me you've had several items tossed out at you already.   What 
evidence there is, is in the form of such things as were discussed and 
written at the time and handed down to us. And of that it seems quite 
clear that nearly all that was written fell into two catagories. On the 
one had there were those who espoused the colour of keys when tuned to 
non ET. There is a myriad of this stuff really.  On the other hand, 
there were those who espoused the uniformnimnity of ET apparently for 
two reasons... the challenge of accomplishing it, and its tonal 
portability.  The now at least 2 centuries of arguing the pros and cons 
of ET seem to always fall into those two basic camps.  How could there 
ever be an argument in the first place unless there were proponents for 
non ET. And what possible reason could they have for being against ET 
unless it was because of the tonalities available by avoiding it ?  And 
that being so... what should stimulate us to beleive that composers 
didnt give a hoot  and were totally unaffected by both the tonalites and 
the disscussions at hand ?

I'll leave all the music theory analysis to those of you who wish to 
delve into that world for evidences.  For me it seems pretty clear cut.  
ET was /is a matter of convenience and one of those mountains to climb 
that we humans so love to ascend.  HT's were full of key colours that 
not only could be exploited... but humans being what they are.. were 
exploited.  After all... we use what is at hand.

Just my view...

Cheers
RicB


_______________________________________________
Pianotech list info: https://www.moypiano.com/resources/#archives