Re: [tuning] Digest Number 4009

> > > > Yeah, but he also says the best harpsichord composer is
> > > > Couperin. :)
> > >
> > > Let us interpret it as `one of the best`. He was, afterall,
> > > an impressive fellow.
> >
> > He's great in the sense that we know his name 400 years later,
> > no doubt greater than most of his contemporaries whose names
> > we don't know, but among those we do, he's not among my favorites.

To be clear: Richard Egarr's remark on that radio show was about *Louis* Couperin, not Francois.

>Unfortunately, I think the Lehman approach sets back Bach >scholarship, as well as early music in the tuning that gives that >extra zing to a composer.

Do you even know what "the Lehman approach" is? Ever come to any of my concerts, or pick up any of the CDs? When I play a gig that works completely in meantone (or similar), or otherwise closely segregated repertoire, I still use temperaments that as closely match that repertoire as possible. My practice in this hasn't changed in 20 years of doing this; I just have an additional option now, when the concert also happens to include the Bachs or other composers who need something very smoothly circulating.

Like, for example, this concert from last autumn that had a trek through all 24 keys:
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/2005nov21.htm

Meanwhile, I keep one of my harpsichords here in various regular meantones almost all the time, and do some of my practicing regularly on that....especially in 16th and early 17th century music.

>Some composers really lose out when played in equal (Buxtehude, >Telemann) while others can be played in almost anything (like Bach >-- although he sounds awful in just).

Have you actually played through all, or even a significant percentage, of the Bach test pieces I have listed at
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/larips/testpieces.html
? Sure, Bach's music "can be played" in tunings that make rough sounds (like Werckmeister III which isn't even for harpsichords at all!); and quite a few fine musicians still do so. But, that alone doesn't constitute an argument that it *should* be.

Why should Bach's music be constrained to make rough/ugly sounds, as if that feature (alone) suddenly confers some extra degree of authenticity to it? How?

And I agree with you that Buxtehude and Telemann sound lousy in equal; so does Bach, IMO. Dull and colorless.

>Not incidentally, the AFMM is present Joshua Pierce in the Duetto #2 >by Bach in Werckmeister III since Brad declared it the killer piece >to determine Bach was not in WIII. Sounds great to us!

And you *like* those clashes that come up, especially in bars 74-105 when using W-III? Listening at a variety of tempos, and a variety of distances from the instrument? *Playing* the instrument with your head right there by the soundboard?

To W-III's credit, it sounds a lot less hellish in that passage than regular meantones (and variants) do. But still, all those spots in W-III where the bass is more than 81/80 too low for the center of the harmony...ugh! This Duetto lays them right out there, naked as major 10ths and 17ths: Db-F and Ab-C especially.

>Of course Bach sounds awful in just intonation. He implicitely assumes
>that 81/80 is tempered out all over the place.

And there's the famous remark by Sorge, also, that Bach despised intervals that were 81/80 or more out of tune.

Cheers,

Brad Lehman