RE: [tuning] Sequencing [was: Another piece with "no tuning file" ]

Steve Sycamore wrote,

>Some sections of the first Bach composition you tuned sound great.
>But I wonder if something went awry with the program because the
>piece is so long or the number of available channels was exceeded.
>There are times when almost every note is very flat, maybe as much
>as 60 cents. Is it possible that offset got compounded with offset at
>times?

I listened to the pieces on John's website and everything sounds great.
Could you specify the piece, minutes, seconds, so I can compare how it comes
out on my machine?

John deLaubenfels wrote,

>In researching Steve's observations, I made the program compile the
>maximum and minimum deviations from 12-tET that a given tuning produces.
>The results are, I think, quite interesting! For b-b-b, I find:

>b-b-bjcs5.mid: Bend range applied: -14.0707 to 14.0739
>b-b-bjes2.mid: Bend range applied: -16.7419 to 15.1923
>b-b-bjcs7.mid: Bend range applied: -18.6853 to 18.7531

>Notice how much more deviation the "no tuning file" version has than
>the original 5-limit tuning! This is due, no doubt, to what has to
>happen when two minor thirds, each targeting almost 16 cents more than
>12-tET, are stacked together. The tritone thus formed targets an
>interval more than 31 cents wider than 12-tET, pushing the deviations
>accordingly.

>I'm coming to think that, in spite of the desirable purity of the minor
>thirds in the "no tuning file" versions, the original 5-limit tunings
>are superior because they have less horizontal motion.

John, don't confuse deviations from 12-tET with horizontal motion. For
example, a 12-tone 1/4-comma meantone tuning will have even larger
deviations from 12-tET, but absolutely _no_ horizontal motion.

John wrote,

>True, but in fact the "no tuning file" versions _do_ have more
>horizontal motion than the original 5-limit versions:

Thanks for digging that up, but this paints a very different picture:

cs5: 13776.655
es2: 15725.116
cs7: 52987.852

than what you posted, which was:

cs5: -14.0707 to 14.0739
es2: -16.7419 to 15.1923
cs7: -18.6853 to 18.7531

In fact one would be inclined to say that there is no significant difference
between the amount of horizontal motion in the two 5-limit versions, and
much greater differences would occur if one used different spring strengths
and/or a different piece of music.