In a message dated 10/15/00 8:19:06 AM Central Daylight Time, istuner@islandia.is (Kristinn Leifsson) writes: << Hi Bill I CRAVE to see your evil tuning. Come on, do you really expect your "Equal-Beating Victorian Temperament" to survive its creator if you keep going about things like you are, the negative way? As I understand it, and I have even been told so in private e-mails, youŽre really good at what you do. You thereby have the basis for making something out of your invention. You have built something that you truly and honestly believe has great quality to it, and you have the technical capability of showing it. I tell you what. You agree to come over here to the seminar and present your EBVT and perhaps IŽll agree to present the oh so highly diversified LWKT. :) >> Sorry to have confused you with my own style of humor which, admittedly, few people get. I wasn't so sure you weren't joking, yourself. One of my pet peeves is acronyms which aren't explained. I have no idea what LWKT stands for. As for me presenting the EBVT, be careful of what you wish for. I designed my own temperament and octave combination about 9 years ago because my search for a temperament that I could really be satisfied and comfortable with did not exist. I did, however, find license to create my own from Owen Jorgensen's book, section 73 where it showed that 18th Century tuners frequently took patterns which were in use at the time and adjusted them to suit their own personal taste. Being an experienced piano technician all of my adult life and musician since childhood, I believed I had a good sense for what the "contemporary ear" could and would accept. While most tuners thought only in terms of ET, I recognized long ago that most, particularly aural tuners, were only capable of an approximation at best and very often produced a blatantly unequal temperament. It is not uncommon to find someone's attempt at ET having a combination of pure 5ths and tempered 5ths, tempered enough to have a 2-3 beat per second "wow-wow-wow" to them. The 3rds can also range from pure or nearly pure to the sourest sounding, 40 cent wide nightmare you have ever heard but all claimed to be and *believed* firmly to be ET. Unfortunately, it is a difficult task to point this out to someone. It "attacks" their very foundation of personal security. Although it does no necessarily have to nor is it intended to, it often means to such a person that "everything they always believed is now wrong". As you can imagine, this most often creates a highly defensive posture. The EBVT is designed to work within the tolerance that most people have for irregularity within the temperament but to focus that irregularity upon the Cycle of 5ths, thus giving the temperament the kind of "color" that a typical Well-Tempered Tuning of the 19th Century would have had. Additionally, the Equal-Beating (EB) phenomenon is used to make the temperament amazingly easy to tune by ear and get accurate easily and every time. EB also creates an acoustical "trick", a canceling out effect which makes triads at the top of the Cycle of 5ths sound purer than they really are in a musical context. Since the 3rds at the top of the Cycle of 5ths are only moderate, rather than being pure or nearly pure, the inevitable harshness of too wide (and sour sounding) 3rds at the bottom of the Cycle is avoided. This unique temperament scheme is coupled with an equally unique EB octave tuning system which is also easily done by ear with the kind of consistency usually only expected from an electronic tuner. It uses the piano's own inharmonicity and limitations imposed by tempering to create the kind of octaves that produce amazing, ear-opening clarity and the most uncanny, pleasing resonance from the piano you have ever heard. Any kind of music that is normally played on a piano tuned in ET can be played on a piano tuned in the EBVT. If a side by side comparison is made of a piano tuned in the usual way and the EBVT, most people seem to be somehow drawn to the sound created by the EBVT. They find it pleasing, captivating, interesting and universally palatable and will most often prefer it over the usual ET. This has been my experience for all of these years and it was confirmed both at the Convention in Providence and at a Chicago Chapter meeting last year. In both cases, the Golden Hammer Award winning and most highly esteemed aural tuning technician of all, Virgil Smith RPT was the person presenting the piano tuned in ET. Even though Virgil had always expressed dislike of anything but ET in the past, at these events, even he was impressed with what I had done. So, from this accounting, you might be thinking that this is something you would really want to learn about but there is always a down side to everything. There will always be those who do not want to hear, read about or even acknowledge the existence of anything but ET. As far as they are concerned, any HT demonstration only proves why ET is the only way to tune a piano. Even though I was asked to present this at the last Convention, I decided not to for several reasons. For starters, I had an opportunity to participate in a musical event elsewhere which to me was much more gratifying than going to the Convention to face the scowl and contempt that I knew would be awaiting me there. Even though there were many people who wrote of their interest and have since then requested information, by my estimation, for every one that wanted to hear what I had to offer, there were and still are at least 3 who don't even want to see it on the schedule. Furthermore, there would not have been the opportunity to hear it in performance and even if there had been, that in itself may have created unprecedented turmoil. Not that I didn't expect any of this but I am often accused of many things and attacked on many fronts. Even to express this will and has lead any number of people to "psychoanalyze" me, sometimes complete with a diagnosis and prescription. Let's see...thinks of himself or his accomplishments as more important than they really are...feels persecuted...exhibits antisocial behavior...avoids social contact...frequently attacks others without provocation...etc.... I have people writing anonymous notes to me all the time suggestion that my "medication" needs to be adjusted. Believe me, it's all very amusing to me but nothing that hasn't happened to anyone else who has ever tried to come up with something unique and which doesn't seem to follow other's "unwritten rules". Ed Foote answered your question and actually gave a good answer, the kind that most HT advocates would offer: Thomas Young #1 and maybe a Meantone for contrast. Many, many times I have been told, "Play safe, don't "shock" them. Be humble or the confidence you have in yourself and your abilities may be seen as arrogance." If you are giving this seminar at a university, this is what is expected, something out of a book, something *historically* documented, polite and understated. I, on the other hand, will do none of that and thus am immediately vulnerable to the "who do you think you are?" kind of cross examination. So, the choice is yours. Do what Ed Foote says and prove to everyone that yes, the piano can make some, well...interesting sounds, ahem...if tuned in one of the myriad of available bizarre alternatives (but we'll continue to use ET, thank you), or ask me to show you what I know how to do. I would not at all be surprised if the "wisdom" of the university faculty would want to hear what's in the books over what some kook of doubtful sanity from the Capital City of kookiness, Madison, Wisconsin has to offer. E-mail me with the details of your event if you are interested. I don't know when it is and chances are, it may conflict with rehearsal and performance dates which are firm and under contract on my calendar. In any case, I am flattered by your interest. Bill Bremmer RPT Madison, Wisconsin
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