Werck III again

Werck III again (was: Re: PITCH Early CD URL for review)

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Afmmjr@... wrote:
>
>
> Location of Early CD on CD Baby: review is at the bottom
>
> http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/pitchrecs2/
>

Hi Johnny,

I am interested in hearing this...

JR: Hi, Aaron, and thanks for joining the discussion.

Aaron: Whatever one thinks of Lehman's ideas, he does bring up the point
about Werck III being an organ tuning specifically. I haven't seen
evidence to the contrary, so I assume he's right about this.

JR: Yes, but I see no difference in terms of a theory to tune a keyboard. In Werckmeister’s day, it was more important to give “special” instructions on tuning the organ because of the huge expense and time factor (8 days for a good tuning?).

Aaron: What evidence do you have that it was applied apart from *organs* that
you can refer us to?

JR: Reading Werckmeister, himself, one gains an understanding of the harpsichord as a more chancy instrument in terms of pitch retention, and more likely tuned by students, and other non-professionals. In this light, “equal temperament” is the “almost” equalness that the non-professional is likely to achieve, uncoached.

Aaron: We do know that Bach had contact with Silbermann, who had his own
clavier tuning. Why not go that route?

JR: If you mean a meantone route, it has been successfully disproven by Murray Barbour many years ago. The method used was to analyze the amount of distinct notes in Bach organ works and see if they were out of the meantone compass, the great majority of which were.

Aaron: There's also the possibility that Bach devised his own tuning, which
he didn't care to publish. Whether or not it has been reconstructed to
date is moot. He may have simply thought that tuning was a relitively
*unimportant* aspect of his music, and as long as a tuning
circulated, it was fine....(certainly, Bach has been performed
convincingly in everything from 12-TET to pick-your-WT-flavor to
various meantones).
JR: All fun philosophically to imagine. But so what with all this speculation? Pragmatic performances need a specific tuning for an evening’s concert. A choice must be made. And why not the most likely candidate as seen by the greatest pooling of Bach information, a result of modern scholarship? Neidhardt was just too damn young to be very influential on JS Bach, if Bach indeed have tuning he used for his chromatic music throughout his life. It is possible it was a family recipe. Any writer on music, such as an Andereas Werckmeister, would have to recognize the famous brilliance of the Bach family’s Johann Chrisoph Bach, practically living in his backyard, geographically speaking. How many composers would change their tuning for their music mid-life but not tell anyone? Too shady, man. The guy was a conservative. :)

Aaron: I'm sure we would have more exacting records of Bach's preferences if
he had any (or his son's, and we know that CPE simply spells out
unmathematical generalizations about what a clavier tuning ought be,
but nothing particularly detailed).

JR: Red herring. Post JS Bach is on the move in all new directions. Bach student Kirnberger “shot himself in the foot” in the sense that while reporting on Bach, Kirnberger switched tunings on the reader, actually attempting to “improve” upon Bach. The sons were each in different directions: W.F. Bach was the improviser and a composer in sixth comma (based on the cities he worked in), C.P.E. was an ill-favored composer of the Emperor (who was in sixth-comma meantone based on a study on Quant’s 13 flutes extant that were built – by Quantz, himself – for the Emperor, his private flute student, while the youngest JC Bach kicked the continent to help usher in the true classical period.

Aaron: Why should we think that the
insistence on one "true tuning" is anything more than religion of
sorts? (and that applies to Lehman, too :) -- I'm not taking *any*
sides in this debate except to say that maybe it's really not all that
important -- yes yes we have new colors when we try new tunings, but
why would Bach really say there was *one* way -- the very definition
of the death of art)

Regards,
Aaron.

Johnny: Religion is an incendiary that I have less to do with that most anyone. After studying all the available material, listening to all the different opinions, visiting all the places I could (with quite good results), and performing the great composer’s music in all combinations with microtonally-gifted early music musicians, I’m making a call.

There has been no argument that has gained legs, first mainly by intuition, later by new discoveries. Each and every Bach City had an organ that was previously in a chromatic tuning, and that tuning was LIKELY in Werckmeister III. These are Weimar, Arnstadt, Muhlhausen, Cothen, and Leipzig. There is a good history for each. The harpsichord follows the organ. The private clavichord is the true independent due to the individuality possible by adding pressure upon the physical keys.

Best, Johnny
________________________________________________________________________
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Johnny,

Interesting discussion as always!

I'm still not convinced that Bach cared all that much as we seem to
about what tuning to play his works in. I imagine him to be a
pragmatist in the sense that whatever chromatic tuning worked was fine.

Let's agree that this is all speculation, which keeps it interesting
at least. We can also agree that if Bach cared so much about it, we'd
here about it from documents. But we don't.

But I'm glad you are pursuing this passionately at the same time, as I
am that Brad Lehman and others are. Whatever 'right' or 'wrong' is
being done is in service of finding truth and beauty, and it's all good.

Whether or not Bach was in Werck III as you claim, my ear favors less
'bumpy' and more subtle WT tunings for Bach. It is also probably the
case that there are countless ad-hoc improvised unpublished 'personal
recipe' tunings that went on all the time. Bach would probably have a
good laugh at how people focus on this kind of stuff, I think. The
only thing I *can* say is that he would probably agree that the color
affects of WT are much stronger than 12-eq, and prefer whatever WT you
could name over 12-eq (for the most part anyway)

This relates to Bach on the piano and harpsichord. I love both, but I
prefer the perhaps (somewhat) anachronistic piano in most scenarios,
provided it is done with taste, and is informed by knowledge of
Baroque practice and articulation. Nowadays, any pianist worth his
salt is at least a decent Bach player. And there are some exceptional
ones as well.

Best,
Aaron.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Afmmjr@... wrote:
>
>
> Werck III again (was: Re: PITCH Early CD URL for review)
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Afmmjr@ wrote:
> >
> >
> > Location of Early CD on CD Baby: review is at the bottom
> >
> > http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/pitchrecs2/
> >
>
> Hi Johnny,
>
> I am interested in hearing this...
>
>
> JR: Hi, Aaron, and thanks for joining the discussion.
>
> Aaron: Whatever one thinks of Lehman's ideas, he does bring up the
point
> about Werck III being an organ tuning specifically. I haven't seen
> evidence to the contrary, so I assume he's right about this.
>
>
> JR: Yes, but I see no difference in terms of a theory to tune a
keyboard. In Werckmeister’s day, it was more important to give
“special” instructions on tuning the organ because of the huge
expense and time factor (8 days for a good tuning?).
>
> Aaron: What evidence do you have that it was applied apart from
*organs* that
> you can refer us to?
>
>
> JR: Reading Werckmeister, himself, one gains an understanding of
the harpsichord as a more chancy instrument in terms of pitch
retention, and more likely tuned by students, and other
non-professionals. In this light, “equal temperament” is the
“almost” equalness that the non-professional is likely to achieve,
uncoached.
>
> Aaron: We do know that Bach had contact with Silbermann, who had
his own
> clavier tuning. Why not go that route?
>
>
> JR: If you mean a meantone route, it has been successfully
disproven by Murray Barbour many years ago. The method used was to
analyze the amount of distinct notes in Bach organ works and see if
they were out of the meantone compass, the great majority of which were.
>
> Aaron: There's also the possibility that Bach devised his own
tuning, which
> he didn't care to publish. Whether or not it has been reconstructed to
> date is moot. He may have simply thought that tuning was a relitively
> *unimportant* aspect of his music, and as long as a tuning
> circulated, it was fine....(certainly, Bach has been performed
> convincingly in everything from 12-TET to pick-your-WT-flavor to
> various meantones).
> JR: All fun philosophically to imagine. But so what with all this
speculation? Pragmatic performances need a specific tuning for an
evening’s concert. A choice must be made. And why not the most
likely candidate as seen by the greatest pooling of Bach information,
a result of modern scholarship? Neidhardt was just too damn young to
be very influential on JS Bach, if Bach indeed have tuning he used for
his chromatic music throughout his life. It is possible it was a
family recipe. Any writer on music, such as an Andereas Werckmeister,
would have to recognize the famous brilliance of the Bach family’s
Johann Chrisoph Bach, practically living in his backyard,
geographically speaking. How many composers would change their tuning
for their music mid-life but not tell anyone? Too shady, man. The
guy was a conservative. :)
>
> Aaron: I'm sure we would have more exacting records of Bach's
preferences if
> he had any (or his son's, and we know that CPE simply spells out
> unmathematical generalizations about what a clavier tuning ought be,
> but nothing particularly detailed).
>
> JR: Red herring. Post JS Bach is on the move in all new directions.
Bach student Kirnberger “shot himself in the foot” in the sense
that while reporting on Bach, Kirnberger switched tunings on the
reader, actually attempting to “improve” upon Bach. The sons were
each in different directions: W.F. Bach was the improviser and a
composer in sixth comma (based on the cities he worked in), C.P.E. was
an ill-favored composer of the Emperor (who was in sixth-comma
meantone based on a study on Quant’s 13 flutes extant that were
built â€" by Quantz, himself â€" for the Emperor, his private flute
student, while the youngest JC Bach kicked the continent to help usher
in the true classical period.
>
> Aaron: Why should we think that the
> insistence on one "true tuning" is anything more than religion of
> sorts? (and that applies to Lehman, too :) -- I'm not taking *any*
> sides in this debate except to say that maybe it's really not all that
> important -- yes yes we have new colors when we try new tunings, but
> why would Bach really say there was *one* way -- the very definition
> of the death of art)
>
>
> Regards,
> Aaron.
>
> Johnny: Religion is an incendiary that I have less to do with that
most anyone. After studying all the available material, listening to
all the different opinions, visiting all the places I could (with
quite good results), and performing the great composer’s music in
all combinations with microtonally-gifted early music musicians, I’m
making a call.
>
> There has been no argument that has gained legs, first mainly by
intuition, later by new discoveries. Each and every Bach City had an
organ that was previously in a chromatic tuning, and that tuning was
LIKELY in Werckmeister III. These are Weimar, Arnstadt, Muhlhausen,
Cothen, and Leipzig. There is a good history for each. The
harpsichord follows the organ. The private clavichord is the true
independent due to the individuality possible by adding pressure upon
the physical keys.
>
> Best, Johnny
> ________________________________________________________________________
> Check out the new AOL. Most comprehensive set of free safety and
security tools, free access to millions of high-quality videos from
across the web, free AOL Mail and more.
>

Aaron: Johnny, interesting discussion as always! I'm still not convinced that Bach cared
all that much as we seem to about what tuning to play his works in. I imagine him to be a
pragmatist in the sense that whatever chromatic tuning worked was fine.

Johnny: Hi Aaron, thanks for the response. My study of Bach brings me to a man that, while indeed pragmatic, was a control freak. Most players were apparently permitted to improvise in the Baroque period, at least to improvise ornaments, but not J.S. He played in his own groups as conductor, on any manner of different instruments. He had a way about him, likely inherited from his super-star musical family. I must disagree that he didn’t care about the tuning. Just as Bach works in ET, it works in a slew of alternative tunings. Only, Werkmeister III, possibly aided by the fact that Werckmeister did not “name it” and only merely listed it as the first tuning that would allow a circle of 12 major and minor keys, seems a natural. Only nasty sidebars and innuendo disfigure this recognition.

Aaron: Let's agree that this is all speculation, which keeps it interesting
at least. We can also agree that if Bach cared so much about it, we'd
here about it from documents. But we don't.

Johnny: Ever hear of the “Well-tempered Clavier”? That is a naming of a tuning, and historically quite advanced. Ever hear of the “Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue in D minor”? The use of the word “Chromatic” in the title by an obviously chromatic composer (at least to the musicians of the Baroque period) is an indication of tuning. When there is one named tuning (and “Well-tempered” was named by Andreas Werckmeister, himself) then there is no reason to guess when actually making the music. Surely, there were “some” performances of Bach, and others, in Werckmeister III. Why flip out and say there is either nothing to go by, or to make something up based on visual ornaments of a title page, when there is a legitimate chromatic tuning that was culturally connected to JS? No reason at all based on my review of the evidence.

Aaron: But I'm glad you are pursuing this passionately at the same time, as I
am that Brad Lehman and others are. Whatever 'right' or 'wrong' is
being done is in service of finding truth and beauty, and it's all good.
Whether or not Bach was in Werck III as you claim, my ear favors less
'bumpy' and more subtle WT tunings for Bach.

Johnny: Once again, irrelevant to what Bach used. But good for you!

Aaron: It is also probably the
case that there are countless ad-hoc improvised unpublished 'personal
recipe' tunings that went on all the time. Bach would probably have a
good laugh at how people focus on this kind of stuff, I think.

Johnny: He may have been “stuff”ier than you think he was.

Aaron: The only thing I *can* say is that he would probably agree that the color
affects of WT are much stronger than 12-eq, and prefer whatever WT you
could name over 12-eq (for the most part anyway)
Johnny: What makes you think this? Werckmeister never spoke of the different colors as a good thing (although Kirnberger did). It may have been too soon in the evolution of tuning for that kind of reflective enjoyment. La Monte Young didn’t realize that there were “harmonic clouds” from his earlier Well-tuned Piano recordings (which were on uprights). Others told him about it. In fact, Buxtehude made more use of the Werckmeister distinctions between intervals than Bach.

Aaron: This relates to Bach on the piano and harpsichord. I love both, but I
prefer the perhaps (somewhat) anachronistic piano in most scenarios,
provided it is done with taste, and is informed by knowledge of
Baroque practice and articulation. Nowadays, any pianist worth his
salt is at least a decent Bach player. And there are some exceptional
ones as well.

Johnny: It seems that Werckmeister III does not work as well with a piano as it does with the harpsichord. Single strings, like single performers, make more sense when there are 39 intervals (or more as in some of the others) than 12.

All best, Johnny
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> Posted by: "Aaron Krister Johnson" aaron@dividebypi.com
> Whatever one thinks of Lehman's ideas, he does bring up the point
> about Werck III being an organ tuning specifically. I haven't seen
> evidence to the contrary, so I assume he's right about this.

Not only an organ tuning specifically, but one designed to CONVERT older organs from meantone into something more circulating (as are several others presented after it in the same book by Werckmeister). A tuning method that wouldn't be used on new organs, but only to convert old ones with minimal rework!

My bit about that is in part 2 of my paper from two years ago:
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/larips/outline.html
See especially pages 216-217 in there.

...But it's not just me saying so. Here's a recent posting by an organbuilder also pointing out that it was only an organ conversion temperament:
http://listserv.albany.edu:8080/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0611&L=hpschd-l&D=1&T=0&O=D&P=26107

Bradley Lehman
http://www.larips.com

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Brad Lehman <bpl@...> wrote:
>
> > Posted by: "Aaron Krister Johnson" aaron@...
> > Whatever one thinks of Lehman's ideas, he does bring up the point
> > about Werck III being an organ tuning specifically. I haven't seen
> > evidence to the contrary, so I assume he's right about this.
>
> Not only an organ tuning specifically, but one designed to CONVERT
older
> organs from meantone into something more circulating (as are several
> others presented after it in the same book by Werckmeister). (...)
>
> My bit about that is in part 2 of my paper from two years ago:
> http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/larips/outline.html
> See especially pages 216-217 in there.
>
> ...But it's not just me saying so. Here's a recent posting by an
> organbuilder also pointing out that it was only an organ conversion
> temperament:
>
http://listserv.albany.edu:8080/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0611&L=hpschd-l&D=1&T=0&O=D&P=26107
>
>
> Bradley Lehman

AKJ: "I haven't seen evidence to the contrary, so I assume he's right
about this."

A lot of myths have been propagated by the mode of reasoning. When you
read something from Barbour or Jorgensen (or even Jurgenson!) etc.etc.
it *is* necessary to see if they cite original sources, and to look
at what is in those sources, if possible. Otherwise all you have is
the opinion of one 20th- or 21st-century guy, rather than
Werckmeister's own opinion.

If you don't look at the sources, you are equally likely to be correct
by reasoning: "I haven't seen any supporting evidence, so I assume
he's wrong about this."

As to 'WIII' - there is *no* mention of any special method of
converting an organ from meantone to this temperament, or any other,
in the 1691 text. So far as I can tell, Werckmeister meant that his
temperaments should be tuned directly from C round the circle.

From the New Grove article, Brad quotes Lindley's carefully-phrased
'hypothesis' that WIII was 'probably' intended to allow easy retuning
from 1/4-comma MT. According to one possible method, by starting with
1/4-comma MT and tuning as follows:

E-B-F#-C#-G#-D#-Bb-F pure

A-E-B pure

one ends up with 1/4 comma chunks at the right position, and whatever
schisma or inaccuracy remains in the last fifth F-C. No intervals have
to be tempered by ear at all! (Of course this assumes the original 1/4
comma was accurately set.) I believe one could almost as easily get to
'Werckmeister V' by a similar method.

But - to state it again - Werckmeister did n o t mention any such
clever and easy method in 1691. I think he says once in later writings
that it would be easy to retune a meantone organ to his temperaments -
but without giving any such specific method.

Brad alters Lindley's hypothesis by imagining that there might have
been commonly, in 1691, organs tuned to 1/5 and 1/6 comma meantone as
well (and also meantones with fractions of the Pythagorean comma).
Then by 'direct examination of frequency charts' he announces which
notes of these meantones would be so close to those required by WIII
so as not to require 'much' retuning (meaning a couple of cents).

However, this does not amount to a practical method, since frequency
charts did not exist, and in any case if one started with 1/5 or 1/6
comma almost all of the notes would require, not just retuning by pure
intervals (as with 1/4-comma), but re-tempering by an amount which was
more difficult to check by ear. Also, many notes such as Eb and G#
would require quite large retunings, so it is not clear what is the
special merit of having small retunings in three or four notes.

To put it another way round, if you start with some regular 1/xth
comma meantone, then retune to a 'well-temperament' which was based on
some regular 1/yth meantone steps among the diatonic keys, with y not
too different from x, it is *guaranteed* that a few notes will be
quite close, or identical, to the original meantone. That isn't
evidence of an intention to create a clever 'conversion' scheme.

Brad has further claimed that WIV is a 'conversion' starting with 1/6
comma meantone. However, it is not clear why, if you did start with
regular 1/6 comma, you would want to muck the fifths up by
substituting alternating 1/3-comma and pure. Werckmeister did give
verbal instructions for this tuning (which appears to me the simplest
and crudest of the four 'good temperaments') and these instructions
simply say to go directly round the circle tuning either flat or pure
or sharp fifths. Nothing about using notes from any pre-existing
temperament. I don't think the idea of 'conversion' from 1/6 comma to
WIV makes any sense, either musical or historical.

But it's still there on Brad's website - as is the claim that 1/6
comma 'well-temperament' was a 17th century Venetian tuning and was
known to Werckmeister in 1681.

Bottom line, anyone who says that WIII was intended to be a specially
easy way, or 'attempt', to 'convert' meantone organs to a good
temperament by clever retuning methods, is stating no more than their
personal opinion or hypothesis. Werckmeister himself didn't talk about
any such methods in 1691, which is extremely odd if in fact (as
claimed by Brad) this was the main point of his temperament design.

I think the most likely reason why Werckmeister chose this or that
configuration of fifths is just that he found the resulting
temperaments were simple enough to describe without great amounts of
arithmetic and without impracticably tiny monochord divisions, and
would sound good or good enough in given musical situations.

I can't rule out that he could have had in mind, for No.III, a clever
and easy retuning method starting with the universal 1/4 comma
meantone. But if so, he never wrote it down. Why present your own
speculations about Werckmeister's possible unwritten intentions as
fact - rather than simply presenting the source material?

(I also can't rule out that he could have had 12-ET in mind but didn't
talk about it because the monochord divisions would have been too tiny
to draw!... Read his chapter 28 'Of Temperament in General' (1691) and
see if it doesn't sound like ET to you.)

~~~T~~~

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Tom Dent" <stringph@...> wrote:
> I also can't rule out that he could have had 12-ET in mind but didn't
> talk about it because the monochord divisions would have been too tiny
> to draw!...

W. wrote in his:
"Die nothwendigsten Anmerckungen/ und Regeln wie der BASSUS CONTIUUS..."
2nd Ed.(poshum by his gammer J.G. Carl) Aschersleben 1715

on p.69/70:
"...diejenigen aber / so diese HYPOTHESIN-MATEMATICE behaupten /
und in 12. Clavibus in einer Octava, und folglich durchs ganze Clavier
wollen schweben lassen /dieselben irren gar sehr: in unserem Monochordo
ist der Irrthum klar vor die Augen gestellet /man circuliere und rechne
es nach / die Wahrheit lieget vor Augen."

...but those that claim the 'mathematical hypothesis'
wanting beating in all 12 keys in one octave,
and hence through the whole piano /
that make very much mistakes:
in our monochord that mistake is clearly shown for the eyes/
verfify that by circulating and calculating yourself/
so arises the truth in the eyes.
"

I.m.o: By that W. refuses appearently
all other coeval somehow "12ET" approximations however else.

A.S.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "a_sparschuh" <a_sparschuh@...> wrote:
>
>
> W. wrote in his:
> "Die nothwendigsten Anmerckungen/ und Regeln wie der BASSUS CONTIUUS..."
> 2nd Ed.(poshum by his gammer J.G. Carl) Aschersleben 1715
>
> on p.69/70:
> "...diejenigen aber / so diese HYPOTHESIN-MATEMATICE behaupten /
> und in 12. Clavibus in einer Octava, und folglich durchs ganze Clavier
> wollen schweben lassen /dieselben irren gar sehr: in unserem Monochordo
> ist der Irrthum klar vor die Augen gestellet /man circuliere und rechne
> es nach / die Wahrheit lieget vor Augen."
>
> (...)
> I.m.o: By that W. refuses appearently
> all other coeval somehow "12ET" approximations however else.
>
> A.S.

It is not much changed from the 1698 version.

See http://harpsichords.pbwiki.com/Werckmeister_Anmerckungen_1698

"Es kan auch
diese Gewohnheit zu reden aus dem genere diatonico herkommen / denn
wenn F c c g g d d a a e' e h 1/4 Comma schweben / so werden die
Tertien rein; diejenigen aber so. diese Hypothesin mathematice
behaupten und in 2. Clavi-
...
-bus in einer Octava, und folglich durchs gantze Clavier wollen
schweben lassen / dieselben irren gar sehr: in unsern Monochordo ist
der Irrthum klar vor die Augen gestellet / man circule und rechne es
nach / die Wahrheit lieget vor Augen."

It means, what happens when the 1/4 comma temperament is taken through
the whole chromatic keyboard, not only for the 'genere diatonico'. So,
maybe there is a misprint '2' for '12'. But he is not concerned with
12-equal here.

How about page 63-64:

"es können
...
zwar alle Quinten 1/12 Commatis die oberste von der untersten /
herunter schweben / dahingegen die Tertia majores 2/3 zu groß die
Minores 3/4 zu klein werden / welches alles zu erdulden / wenn man
durch das gantze Clavier gehen wolte / und aus allen Clavibus alle
Lieder tractire würde."

saying basically - 12-ET is OK, to play all songs in all keys.

~~~T~~~