Temperament in English Virginal Music

Greetings,

I'm still working on the temperament lecture and want to thank those people
for their helpful suggestions and advice in previous posts.

But as I ponder this material one question pops up as an aside: what
temperament would be suitable for English Virginal music? I just played
through a Fantasy ut, re mi etc, by John Bull from the Fitzwilliam
collection. There is a note:

'This interesting experiment in enharmonic modulation is thus tentatively
expressed in the MS; the passage proves that some kind of "equal
temperament" must have been employed at this date.'

I doubt that it proves that. But what temperament would have been
characteristic of the time?

All best wishes,

Gordon Rumson



Canadian Pianist and Composer

Founder and Proprietor of Sikesdi Press
Music Publishers of the "New and Little Known"
Music by Sorabji, Johansen, Mellers, Flynn, ApIvor and others.
Please visit our Web Page at:
http://www.cadvision.com/Home_Pages/accounts/liszt/SikesdiPressWebpage.html

tuning@eartha.mills.edu wrote:

> TUNING Digest 1351
>
> Topics covered in this issue include:
>
> 1) Conversion kits for pianos
> by "Patrick Ozzard-Low"
> 2) Temperament in English Virginal Music
> by rumsong@cadvision.com (Gordon Rumson)
> 3) Re: 7TET, Reply to Paul H. Erlich
> by "Ed & Alita Morrison"
> 4) microtnl autoharp
> by Erik Nauman
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Topic No. 1
>
> Date: Wed, 11 Mar 1998 17:08:26 +0000
> From: "Patrick Ozzard-Low"
> To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu
> Subject: Conversion kits for pianos
> Message-ID: <199803111657.QAA14924@imail.norfolk.gov.uk>
>
> Judith Conrad wrote:
>
> > I saw on rec.musicmakers.piano the other day that Story and Clark piano
> > company sells conversion kits for putting electronic innards into old junk
> > pianos. Anyone know anything about this? Are they tunable? I was once
> > given an 88-note silent keyboard...
>
> I have seen a number of these systems - including MIDI compatible
> ones. There is a company in Cambridge UK which specialises in such
> transformations, and there certainly used to be various
> do-it-yourself kits available. I can't remember the names of them
> now (there was one available some years ago called 'Crystal Keys') -
> but at some point when I have time I could find out easily enough.
> (By 'electronic innards' I'm assuming you mean sensors under the
> piano keys which pick up note on/off, velocity, and presumably some
> thing to do with the sustain pedal - rather than player-piano type
> innards?). To damp the piano some very heavy felt or even felted
> wire to catch the hammers will do, tho you wouldn't need it on the
> silent keyboard.
>
> > >Are they tunable?
>
> As tunable as the MIDI device you play it through.
>
> Patrick O-L
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Topic No. 2
>
> Date: Wed, 11 Mar 1998 21:15:01 -0700
> From: rumsong@cadvision.com (Gordon Rumson)
> To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu
> Subject: Temperament in English Virginal Music
> Message-ID:
>
> Greetings,
>
> I'm still working on the temperament lecture and want to thank those people
> for their helpful suggestions and advice in previous posts.
>
> But as I ponder this material one question pops up as an aside: what
> temperament would be suitable for English Virginal music? I just played
> through a Fantasy ut, re mi etc, by John Bull from the Fitzwilliam
> collection. There is a note:
>
> 'This interesting experiment in enharmonic modulation is thus tentatively
> expressed in the MS; the passage proves that some kind of "equal
> temperament" must have been employed at this date.'
>
> I doubt that it proves that. But what temperament would have been
> characteristic of the time?
>
> All best wishes,
>
> Gordon Rumson
>
> Canadian Pianist and Composer
>
> Founder and Proprietor of Sikesdi Press
> Music Publishers of the "New and Little Known"
> Music by Sorabji, Johansen, Mellers, Flynn, ApIvor and others.
> Please visit our Web Page at:
> http://www.cadvision.com/Home_Pages/accounts/liszt/SikesdiPressWebpage.html
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Topic No. 3
>
> Date: Thu, 12 Mar 1998 01:36:56 -0600
> From: "Ed & Alita Morrison"
> To:
> Subject: Re: 7TET, Reply to Paul H. Erlich
> Message-ID: <199803120734.BAA22591@mail2.texas.net>
>
> I have been looking at 5 and 7 TET scales and also pelog and slendro and
> others which are not equal tempered scales. They are interesting, but I
> need to spend more time on them to use them. That will take time. ALITA
> MORRISON
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Topic No. 4
>
> Date: Thu, 12 Mar 1998 08:17:17 -0500
> From: Erik Nauman
> To: "'tuning@eartha.mills.edu'"
> Subject: microtnl autoharp
> Message-ID:
>
> Check the Deep Listening Space web page for a performance I'm giving
> with Doug Cohen on April 4. Doug uses all kinds of electronic
> manipulation in his music and I will perform four pieces for a
> microtonal autoharp tuned to an 11-limit just intonation. If you're in
> the Kingston neck of the woods, drop in!
>
> http://www.deeplistening.org/events.html
>
> ------------------------------
>
> End of TUNING Digest 1351
> *************************