There are many modern string players who are quite informed about
intonation. Kolisch, when playing Schoenberg's Fantasy, tuned all four
strings to the piano, in order to play more precisely in equal
temperament. Paul Zukofsky and Marc Sabat have both integrated
alternative tunings into their playing. Sabat, in particular, has
phenomenal control and plays various just systems, pythagorean,
meantone, or tempered as required by the repertoire. In the
Netherlands, the Lemkes/Vos duo specialized in playing 31-tone equal
temperament, which is virtually indistinguishable from an extended
quarter-comma meantone. Cellist Anton Lukoszevieze has specialized in
works in which tuning is a central concern. And there are a number of
quartets that do phenomenal work with alternative tunings, whether
tempered or just, in scores from Haba to Ben Johnston, to Lou Harrison.
Daniel Wolf
dc wrote:
J
I've never seen a modern violinist who even knows what a meantone
fifth is, let alone accepts to tune his fiddle in anything but what he
calls "in tune". For a modern cellist, an interval is either in tune
or out of tune. There's no meantone, unequal, well-tempered or what
fifth. A fifth is a fifth, as I said. I've had many of them look at me
with the most surprised face when I ask them how they tune their
instruments, as if there was more than one way to tune. On the other
hand, string players who come to 17th century music not from Mozart or
Haydn or Beethoven but from Renaissance music have no trouble tuning
and playing in meantone.
Dennis
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