Schoenberg's 12-eq string quartets

[Graham Breed:]
>> [Schoenberg] was, I think, the first composer to specify
>> that a string quartet should be played in 12-equal

[Patrick Ozzard-Low:]
> But Graham, do you have a
> source for the claim in your last sentence?

[Schoenberg, 1934 letter to Joseph Yasser, (Yasser's
translation), quoted by Daniel Wolf in TD 1386:]
> ''...indeed whenever I have had occasion to take up
> intonation with string players, I have always insisted
> on its _tempered_ form.(...)

[Monzo:]
Ben Johnston told me once of an anecdote related by
Peter Yates. Yates was present at a rehearsal of
a Schoenberg string quartet, supervised by the composer.
Yates said that Schoenberg had a piano present, had
it scrupulously tuned to 12-eq, and insisted that the
strings rehearse exactly in tune with it to get the intonation
he desired in his quartet.

Joseph L. Monzo
monz@juno.com

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