Beethoven's tuning

I have a question from a friend:

what tuning would Beethoven have had his Broadwoods tuned to (assuming of
course that he would have had them tuned regularly - which he didn't)?

There are some passages in the sonatas that don't make sense either in 12ET
or in some of the meantone tunings. Did german tuners ca. 1800 use a cyclic
temperament, he wonders?

I can't find reference to Beethoven and Tuning anywhere, only Schumann and
Brahms re meantone, and of course Mozart and earlier composers with their
own selective / cyclic tunings.

Mark

> There are some passages in the sonatas that don't make sense
> either in 12ET
> or in some of the meantone tunings.

This is intriguing- could you be more specific?

Dante

--- In tuning@y..., Mark Gould <mark.gould@a...> wrote:
> I have a question from a friend:
>
> what tuning would Beethoven have had his Broadwoods tuned
> to (assuming of course that he would have had them tuned
> regularly - which he didn't)?
>
> There are some passages in the sonatas that don't make sense
> either in 12ET or in some of the meantone tunings. Did german
> tuners ca. 1800 use a cyclic temperament, he wonders?
>
> I can't find reference to Beethoven and Tuning anywhere, only
> Schumann and Brahms re meantone, and of course Mozart and
> earlier composers with their own selective / cyclic tunings.
>
>
> Mark

hi Mark,

i've been researching this very topic for a while.

Beethoven played organ, violin, and viola quite a bit as a youth,
so it's very likely that he was exposed to meantone a lot in
those days.

as for his piano tuning, the most likely tuning would have been
a "circulating / irregular / well-temperament". my own opinion
is that this was most likely Kirnberger III, but it could have
also been Valloti/Young or Werckmeister III, or something similar.

i've been working on a webpage with an mp3 and analysis of
the famous first movement of the "Moonlight Sonata" in
Kirnberger III ... hope to be able to upload it sometime this
month.

-monz