Historical Temperaments

[ATodd@UH.EDU]

   Thought some of you interested in historical temperaments might enjoy these
descriptions of some of the keys.

>>   There was recently a recital at Rice University in Houston, given by
Benjamin Garber, piano (actually a lecture-recital) "demonstrating the
difference between our modern temperament and the temperaments used in the
18th and 19th centuries using differently tuned pianos and fortepiano".
   Musicians in the 18th and 19th centuries tuned their pianos differently
than we do today. These musicians knew that unique characters for each key
were created by the slightly unequal chromatic scales of the various
historical well-temperaments. Find out why musicians wrote these
descriptions referring to different keys:

   C-Major - "Cheerful and pure, innocence and simplicity," Weikert, 1827
   C#-minor - "Penitential lamentation, intimate conversation with
      God," Schubart, 1722
   D-Major - "Songs of mirth and rejoicing; grandeur and magnificence,"
      Rameau, 1722
   F-minor - "Extreme expression of grief," Knecht, 1792
   Bb-minor - "Preparation for suicide sounds in this key," Schubart, 1784

   Unfortunately, I didn't see the flyer that all the above is taken from
until after the recital. I took a few days off to recover from the Piano
Festival! Wish I had known about it.

Avery Todd, RPT
University of Houston
atodd@uh.edu

P.S. Sorry about any duplication of this for those of you on the piano and/or
     harpsichord lists.