[pianotech] Historic temperaments and modern scaling

[David Love]

I'm sure you'll get lots of opinions on this and the archives are replete
with exhaustive discussion on the topic.  In 1900 ET was well established.
Yamahas and Steinways have not be rescale for ET.  At the time that WTs were
used scale tensions were certainly lower and that tends to reduce the
strength of upper partials and make WTs less objectionable.  I doubt that
scale designers took tuning styles into consideration at all.

 

David Love

www.davidlovepianos.com

 

From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf
Of KeyKat88 at aol.com
Sent: Sunday, July 25, 2010 1:35 PM
To: pianotech at ptg.org
Subject: [pianotech] Historic temperaments and modern scaling

 

Greetings,

 

       Does anyone have any thoughts on tuning a historic temperament on a
modern scaled pianos? When historic temps are tuned in a modern piano, is it
the string's nodes that cause a difference in the sound of the tuning as
compared to an older scale design?

 

       Inside old uprights I see things such as: 1888 patented scale. It's a
reminder to me that a historic tuning will probably sound better on this one
than a newer piano. What temperaments are best on old uprights like this?
Certainly not a Valotti, this temp would be too old. Right? What
temperaments were being tuned say c. 1900? 

 

      Have Yamahas and Steinways been rescaled for E.T.?...or have these
makers kept the old scaling for those that prefer historic tunings? 

 

Julia

PA

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100725/1b7adde1/attachment-0001.htm>