Yahoo Tuning Groups Ultimate Backup mills-tuning-list Was: Octo-tonal composing? (Paul E)

Ed Foote (A440A@aol.com) wrote:

> Hmmmm. I am a lot less interested in winning an argument than I
> am in learning all I can about the history and application of tuning.
> I would hope that the nature of these interchanges doesn't become so
> adversarial as to limit that.

Sorry if you misunderstood academic manners -- an "adversarial" stance
is adopted only in order to sharpen arguments (granted, the temperature
can rise somewhat if a lucidly stated argument is distorted).
Furthermore, I've strongly hinted before that I'm playing devil's
advocate -- I'm not against what you say, but I want to hear the best
possible arguments for the case, so that even the most dogged and
sceptical supporter of the 18th-century ET thesis will be convinced.

> > Walker asks;
> > if ET was well-nigh impossible in the 18th century, as you
> >argue, how come it was in popular use for lutes and viols during the
> >16th century?
> The placement of frets, by linear measurement, is a piece of cake
> compared to tuning by string tension. According to Jorgenson, this
> was mentioned by Mersenne, in his Harmonie Universelle, when he states
> that the equal division of the octave could not be formed on spinets,
> as the string tension had to be judged by ear.

Here's an example, I think, of the adversarial game drawing out a better
argument. In reply, I suppose one might ask why a fretted string
instrument could not then be used as a point of reference by the
keyboard tuner. But otherwise I'm satisfied on this matter.

> However, to say that I am trying to "label anything with
> noticeable differences a well-temperament" does something of a
> disservice to my intentions. These well-temperaments were very
> specific constructions, I use my term "Harmonic Toolbox" to describe.
> what they were offering composersThis supposes that the levels of
> tempering were carefully selected, not just a helter-skelter of missed
> thirds.

So what you would want to establish is that 18th-century keyboard tuners
considered the achievement of ET, accurate beyond audible margins of
error, considered such a hopeless task that it was not worth attempting.
If so, I trust that we would eventually be able to find some recorded
statements to this effect.

> >[JW] forgive me if I'm disinclined to
> >accept any far-reaching thesis purely on the grounds that the ears of
> >some (no doubt able) musician have convinced him of its truth.
>
> This thesis is not, in all fairness, based purely on the the ears.
> The opinions formed by listening have a substantial amount of
> historical support, do they not? I was originally listening to well
> temperaments with the skepticism of one who had heard and tuned
> nothing but ET for many years, but could find no reasons to disbelieve
> the temperaments, ( Schubert too!)
>
> >[JW again] What of the converse: would you like to say that anyone
> >whose stomach doesn't churn at the sound of Beethoven in ET lacks
> some essentials of when I first heard Beethoven played in >musicianship?
>
> Yes, I would like to say that, but I can't. Churn is too strong a
> word. What I can say is that after pianists that I work with have
> become acquainted with the difference in temperament for Beethoven,
> they all prefer something other than ET.

I'm afraid that this, and much else that you've said, goes no further
than to say that well-temperament was a possibility for this music. But
I never argued with this. What I was asking you to do, rather, was to
back up your categorical statement that equal temperament was _not_ used
at all (as a keyboard tuning) in Germany/Austria c.1800. I suspect by
now that you said all you can on this matter, and I thank you for this.

My concern is simply that there is not so far any case which would
withstand scrutiny as an academic paper; since your interests are
practical rather than academic, you may not be worried by this. But it
will prove a difficult task, since at present revisionists such as
Rudolf Rasch, are (as Manuel Op de Coul reminded us) prepared even to
say that Bach might indeed have intended the WTK for equal temperament,
notwithstanding all that has been argued to the contrary. If respected
academics are still prepared to place ET (as a keyboard tuning) back
even as far as the 1720s, there is a great deal to be done before we can
hope to establish the counter-thesis that ET didn't begin to emerge as a
practical possibility (for keyboards) until at least a century later.
Whatever the merits of Rasch's case, there is a very long way to go
before the historical case for the prevalence of well-temperament into
the 19th century has been established. There are two routes by which we
can attack the consensual thesis that ET was well-nigh universal in
Germany/Austria by 1800: one is to provide convincing documentary
evidence to the contrary from contemporary sources (I've still seen
nothing in this respect); the other is to shift the burden of proof onto
those following the consensual thesis, by demonstrating that ET was so
far beyond the capabilities of 18th-century tuners that its supposed
establishment by 1800 is most improbable (you have said a couple of
things which move in this direction). Does anyone know of more material,
or can anyone suggest further arguments which would contribute to either
of these possible lines of attack?

> >Was Chopin (advocate of ET, as I've said before) less than
> >a true musician?
> No, but Chopin was not composing music in the time of Mozart and
> Beethoven, I assume he cut his teeth on a lot less meantone than
> Beethoven, or Mozart.

Meantone? Yes, probably 1/6-comma from good string players, and on some
keyboards (it was Silbermann's choice), but I thought we were talking
about well temperament. Was this a typo?

In any case, would you agree then that for music which modulates freely,
but which remains locally diatonic in most passages (as in Beethoven),
well-temperaments are best, but where local chromaticism becomes more
prevalent (as in later Chopin), then equal temperament is more
satisfactory?

> (For a real treat, listen to his Opus 28
> preludes performed on a DeMorgan temperament. It is a very different
> music indeed, and it could have happened!)

Definitely a typo here (op. 39 Preludes "durch alle Tonarten"). The date
of composition is thought to have been 1789 -- certainly a later Bonn
work -- so the opus number, 39, is misleading in this respect. In this
case, even if (contrary to your view) ET was prevalent by 1800, there is
still a fairly high probability that in relatively provincial Bonn, well
temperament would still have been much in evidence at this date. Tuning
matters aside, I find it particularly interesting that the two preludes
traverse the circuit of keys in different ways: the first reaches C#
major by fifths, then manages to reverse all of this and more in a
wonderful chromatic passage to arrive on a genuine Db major (genuine in
the sense that it is not just a notational convenience), whereupon the
fifths sequence resumes until the final (genuine) C major is reached.
The second prelude, maintains the fifths sequence throughout, and passes
through the cycle twice, so removing changes due to notational
convenience, we pass from C major to A*# major. The first prelude even
manages to maintain a high level of inventiveness, and deserves to be
heard more often on the concert platform.

--
Jonathan Walker
Queen's University Belfast
mailto:kollos@cavehill.dnet.co.uk
http://www.music.qub.ac.uk/~walker/

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Was: Octo-tonal composing? (Paul E)

🔗Manuel.Op.de.Coul@ezh.nl (Manuel Op de Coul)

🔗kollos@cavehill.dnet.co.uk (Jonathan Walker)