Meantone, my personal adventure

[Richard Moody]

Now if I can just find out how terms like "1/4 syntonic comma" lead to the
flattening of fiths, in Meantone, and how this was determined by the
tuners of the times before 1750.  I mean how does 1/4 comma  translate
into beats per second. Yes I know some where it is written that tuners in
the 1700's (18th cent) did not listen to beats, yet the organ tuners did. 

	The exciting part of historical temperaments is that they can be rendered
on modern pianos----that the predictions of physists of the 17th and 18th
century can be translated into cents and therefore plugged into 20th
century tuning machines.  In the interest in "hearing the music as the
masters did" one must realize that the instruments on which they heard
their music  no longer exist execpt as museum pieces or reproductions. 
Hearing modern pianos tuned according to concepts of their time renders
the keyboard music of the Baroque and Classical eras in a new light for
our times.  If performers ask, "Is it possible to tune the modern piano in
Meantone by ear?", I would hope to have something to offer.  
	Now if I can just figure out how much 1/4 syntonic comma flattens fifths
from the aural perspective.  

Richard Moody