Duodene

>>My piano is retuned to have three chains of just fifths, one
>>starting on Eb, one starting on G at a just major third above Eb,
>>making the fifth C to G flat by 21.5 cents, and the third chain of fifths
>>starting on B at a just major third above G.
>
>This is exactly one of the tunings on my Ensoniq. It is identical to
>Ellis' "Duodene", is it not?

It seems to me it is, although it is usually more common to center it on
"C", rather than on "D", as most people find the fingerings easier this way.


>I was playing with this the other day and started playing Pachelbel's
>Canon in D. D major is in fact one of the two "major" keys available in
>this tuning (the other is Bb), where each key has the I, iii, IV, V, and
>vi chords in tune. The Canon has exactly these chords, so it should have
>worked perfectly, right? Not at all. The E in the melody over the
>B-minor chord, though just a passing tone, sounded horrible, and the B
>neighbor tone sounded awful over the A-major chord. I must conclude that
>the only reasonable keyboard tuning for even the simplest triadic
>diatonic music is some form of meantone temperament.

I agree- if I understand what you mean by "triadic diatonic", and if we are
limited to 12 tones. I will add that this tuning is good, even with only
12 tones, for types of music other than "triadic diatonic". Terry Riley
has done some nice minimalist-type stuff with it on his album "The Harp of
New Albion".


Carl