historical temperaments

[Andrew & Rebeca Anderson]

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It is my understanding that Werkmeister was intended for organs and that 
Bach used a different temperament for his stringed keyboard 
instruments.  Kellner's temperament may be a good representation as he was 
a student.
As an aside, I had our baby grand on Barne's Idealized Bach temperament for 
some time.  It really sounded sweet.  I eventually tuned it back to ET for 
practice purposes and we were surprised by how sour and dissonant ET can be 
by comparison.  Mind-you, Debussy was rather less dreamy on Barnes ;-).

Andrew
At 02:48 PM 3/8/2005 -0800, you wrote:
>For Bach specifically, the Werckmeister is widely used, although there are 
>a few other contenders. Go to my website 
><http://rollingball.com/TemperamentsFrames.htm>http://rollingball.com/TemperamentsFrames.htm 
>to see a lot of graphs representing the range of thirds and fifths in each 
>of the temperaments. Bradley Lehman more recently offers one on his 
>website, <http://www.larips.com/>http://www.larips.com/ , using the 
>following offsets which he deduces from Bach's markings on the Anna 
>Magdalena manuscript:
>Eb 3.9
>Bb 3.9
>F 7.8
>C 5.9
>G 3.9
>D 2.0
>A 0.0
>E -2.0
>B 0.0
>F# 2.0
>C# 3.9
>G# 3.9
>
>Note, however, these offsets are all sharp except E, so this will put a 
>lot of additional tension on the piano. To equalize the tension, try:
>Eb +1
>Bb +1
>F +4.9
>C +3
>G +1
>D -0.9
>A -2.9
>E -4.9
>B -2.9
>F# -0.9
>C# +1
>G# +1
>Also be aware that a temperament cannot really be reduced to cents, which 
>are approximations at best. The historic temperaments were usually set by 
>measures like "set this third as sharp as the ear can bear" - or in some 
>cases certain fifths were tuned perfect while others were tuned "as flat 
>as the ear can bear".
>
>| |   | | |   | |   | | |   | |   | | |   | |   | | |   | |   | | |   | 
>|   | | |   | |
>Jason Kanter . piano tuning regulation repair
><mailto:jkanter@rollingball.com>jkanter@rollingball.com . cell 425 830 1561
>serving the eastside and the san juans
>-----Original Message-----
>From: pianotech-bounces@ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org]On 
>Behalf Of Michael Gamble
>Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2005 2:08 PM
>To: jonathan stuchell
>Cc: pianotech@ptg.org
>Subject: Re: historical temperaments
>
>Hello Jonathan
>First - how much time have you got? There's a lot of information out there 
>about "temperaments". This type of tuning is used mainly on historic type 
>instruments: real square pianos (circa late 1700s) Harpsichords and 
>Fortepianos. The temperament we use at Glyndebourne is Vallotti. In fact I 
>have to tune a Kawai grand to this temperament to use with a Harpsichord 
>in rehearsal for Bill Christie. The variation from equal temperament is as 
>follows:
>  a:0   a#:+6.0  b:+2.0  c:+6.0  c#:0.0  d:+2.0  d#:+4.0  e:-2.0  f:+8.0 
> f#:-2:0  g:+4.0  g#:+2.0
>
>The "wildest" off pitch temperament is "Werkmeister-III" where:
>a:0  a#:+17.5  b:-7.0  c:+10.5  c#:-13.5  d:+2.5  d#:+20.5  e:-3.5 
>f:+13.5  f#:-10.0  g:+7.0  g#:-17.0
>
>Lambert(1774) is closest to equal temp.
>
>I shall stop there and put on my flame suit for daring to suggest anything 
>so OT as "temperaments"
>
>Regards from darkest Sussex
>Michael G.(UK)
>----- Original Message -----
>From: <mailto:jstuchell@verizon.net>jonathan stuchell
>To: <mailto:michael@gambles.fsnet.co.uk>Michael Gamble
>Sent: Tuesday, March 08, 2005 4:48 PM
>Subject: historical temperament
>
>   Hello,
>
>         I want to start using historical temperaments.  How do I go about 
> this?  I use a Peterson virtual strobe tuner which has settings for Young,
>Werkmeister, Kirnberger, Pythagorean, Kellner etc.  I would like to use 
>one from J.S. Bach's time.  Information seems hard to find.  Im very 
>interested, because I favor the Baroque period.  Also, Baroque instruments 
>are becoming popular.  Hope you can give me some advice!
>
>
>
>    Thanks,
>
>
>Jonathan Stuchell
>
>
>
>
>
>
>

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