Choosing a Temperament

[Billbrpt@AOL.COM]

In a message dated 8/10/99 4:07:20 PM Pacific Daylight Time, you write:

<< I am puzzeled by this
 buisness of
 tuning a guitar tho. Not really knowing much about how they are built
 (tho I have
 played my share of country and bluegrass on them) I was under the
 impression that
 the "tuning" was part of the placement of the frets.  Also, when you
 play a
 chromatic scale using one string the "tuning" is whatever the designer
 had decided
 it was. Combining this with off tuned singles (by the most recent
 tradition of
 tuning a guitar) cant change the  influence of the fret layout. I wonder
 if such
 instruments built 2, 300 years ago and beyond were "tuned" in this way.
 
 Well, its all a bit off the piano tech subject line, but its food for
 thought
 anyways.
  >>

It is appropriate for this List because it is a tuning concept and question.  
This was argued about quite a bit.  As they say, you can "find it in the 
archives".

I have only the most basic skills with a guitar but sometimes "necessity is 
the mother of invention".  I was among the cast of a production of The Man of 
La Mancha when it became apparent to me that I could help the guitarist a 
little by tuning his instrument for him.  The circumstances were that the 
Opera company, with its proverbial limited budget, could not find or afford 
an available well-qualified guitarist.
They did find someone who was a student of Spanish style guitar playing who 
looked good in the costume they had for him.

He not only had trouble tuning his instrument but also following the 
ensemble.  Everyone pitched in to help him, including me.  He had a fine 
guitar.  The fact that the guitar has a fret board which serves as a grid for 
ET is obvious.  I however theorized that you could still make a Well Tempered 
Tuning out of it by slightly altering the pitch of the various strings.

Now, the guitar does not have a C string.  The tonality of C is usually the 
center and starting point of all usable HT's.  There is one HT however which 
can easily be tuned from A and still get the proper C tonality, the Vallotti. 
 It is a very easy HT for ET tuners to understand:  All 5ths (or 4ths) 
between two black keys or a black and a white key are pure, the rest of the 
4ths & 5ths between the white keys are tempered exactly twice as much as in 
ET.

I could see how I could temper the strings of the guitar, E-A-D-G-B-E exactly 
the way I would on the piano, twice as much as in ET.  I reasoned that the 
frets then would provide the in between notes exactly the same as they would 
be found in a completely worked out scale.  It apparently worked.

I showed the orchestra conductor the results.  G Major for "Little Bird, 
Little Bird", as sweet as candy.  Then I showed him the difference between 
the serenity of A minor and the dark, disturbing sound of Bb and Ab minor.  
All of these keys are found in the score.  The conductor was impressed and I 
had the guitarist tune each of his strings to the program I made for him in 
my SAT each time before he went on.  He ended up having a nice, on-pitch, 
professional sound.

But what I have shown you is about the one and only thing that you can do 
besides tuning in strict ET.  That is the limitation of the guitar.  You 
cannot do any and all other kinds of temperament schemes.  The guitarist at 
the event is named Kevin Gallagher.  I hear he is from New York.

 It was obvious to me that he knew many different ways in which he could 
manipulate the tuning of his guitar.  He also used some nonstandard tunings 
where he lowered the lowest two strings to make them play entirely different 
notes.  He was adept at pulling on the string to stretch it out and stabilize 
it after having changed the pitch radically.  The audience and other 
musicians waited patiently for him each time he retuned.  I have never seen a 
guitarist tune so meticulously and in such a variety of ways.

Bill Bremmer RPT
Madison, Wisconsin