On Sep 25, 2009, at 5:20 PM, David Rastall wrote: > would have necessitated transpositions of as much as a minor third. > Where does the color-coding idea fit into that scheme? You don't > get a combination of colors; you get everybody playing out of tune.
Probably not; see below. > And what about the surviving wind instruments from that period: > were they tuned to a particular temperament? As a practical matter, the wind instruments of the time were so pliable in pitch, because of wind pressure, embouchure changes or alternate fingerings, that temperament per se would not have been much of a concern. The difference between a Kirnberger III E flat and Werckmeister E flat is smaller than the on-the-fly pitch adjustments a player would make without even thinking about it. This is probably still true today, if to a lesser extent. Good wind players don't just finger and blow. In the 1752 "On Playing the Flute" Quantz includes a fingering chart in which the notes we learn as enharmonic equivalents (D sharp and E flat, F flat and E natural) have different fingerings. There are two fingerings for F sharp, and they're both different from G flat. Quantz was obviously assuming finer gradations in pitch than are dreamt of in our philosophy, Horatio. -- To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
