Greetings,
I wrote:
>Acoustically, thirds and fifths work in opposition to one another, which
>generally means that in the traditional form of well temperament, the keys
with
>the most highly tempered thirds will have the purest fifths, and the keys
with
>the purest thirds will have the most highly tempered fifths. It is overly
>simplistic to regard a given key as highly tempered or not.
> If performed on a well-tempered keyboard, this harmonic contrast can be
>heard in Chopin's music, where he often places a pure melodic line above a
very
>expressive harmony, creating a subtle musical texture that is unavailable in
>20th century tuning.
David asks:
<< Do you have a sound source for your take on this? Some Chopin in this
temperment?>>
Naw, On our 6 Degrees CD I decided to go totally experimental and used a
reversed WT for the Chopin. HOwever, I have several customers that play
a lot of Chopin and they were struck by how much less "crowded and blurry"
(their words) Chopin's music sounded on a normal WT, (usually keeping the F#-A#
less than 18 cents.) So much of his writing keeps the left hand busy with
alternating notes that the tempering's effect is not one of dissonance but higher
energy and increased expression, (not unlike Bach's writing in the C# prelude
of the WTC 1). Coleman 11 or Broadwood's "Best" is all it takes to show the
difference, though the Young temperament really cleans up the sound.
There is no sense in me convince others that any temperament does
anything. All I would hope for is that the inquiring technician place one of these
tunings under the hands of an accomplished pianist and make decisions based on
the sound that results. I find that the less I say, the more the musical
difference is perceived as a benefit. If I try to "sell" a pianist on something
new, they are usually resistant before they even hear a note. Fear is a
terrible thing to make decisions on!
Also, Emmanuel Ax didn't say a word about the non-ET tuning on the
concert pianos when he gave a master class here last week, just that the brassy
piano seemed weak in the fifth octave.
Regards,
Ed Foote RPT
http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/index.html
www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_tempered_piano.html
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