(Sorry for the crossposting, but this seems to be a two-list-thread.) I'd like to take the oppurtunity to once again point out Bradley Lehman's Bach-tuning, which can be studied at http://www.larips.com According to his argumentation, equal could well have meant to be _equal-sounding_ in several instances. I quote from his FAQ:
"My thesis is that JS Bach knew very well about equal temperament (in the 1720s and earlier), and rejected its rise in practice by other experts, because he had something better-sounding already in hand. This was a major point in compiling the WTC as demonstration. His "equal-ish" temperament has the same complete flexibility through all keys, all equally usable, but with a healthy and interesting variety of characters also. It makes the jobs of the other players and singers easier and more natural, in the tensions and relaxations it reveals in the music. Interpretation becomes an instinctive reaction to the sound that is already happening: not a fight against equal temperament's sameness to put the phrasing across the footlights." I read somewhere that ET or E-sounding-T became an important issue when professional wind players started to visit european courts around 1700 with differently pitched instruments depending on where they came from. Not surprisingly Neidhard advocates ET only for courts, this enables chromatic transposition to suite the guest artist. String players could adjust easily to the local pitch and meantone variety, and AFAIK choir and chamber pitch were mostly a whole tone apart which also minimizes transposing problems in a meantone temperament. So to me the rise of ET seems to be a practical issue rather than an aesthetical one. It's a pity that unequal but circular temperaments like Lehman's aren't possible on fretted instruments. Regards, Stephan Am 25 Mar 2006 um 12:37 hat Daniel F Heiman geschrieben: > > On Sat, 25 Mar 2006 11:52:58 -0500 "Roman Turovsky" > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > <snip> > > Howard wrote: > > >> Equal > > >> temperament pretty much destroys this expressive effect. Most > > >> baroque music is in one of the simpler keys (i.e. few sharps or > flats > > You forgot the modifier EARLY. In the later baroque where the > > expression is > > based on modulation the ET is essential. > > RT > > > > Equal temperament is NOT essential for music from any part of the > baroque era. Some theorists, composers and performers were advocates > of it, and others were not. For example, Johann Sebastian Bach was > not a fan of equal temperament. He did write a set of pieces entitled > "Das wohltemperierte Klavier," which most commentators now believe > requires a circulating meantone temperament rather than equal tempered > tuning. > > F. W. Marpurg provides twelve different unequally tempered tuning > schemes for keyboard instruments in his Versuch (Breslau, 1776). J. > P. Kirnberger gives a meantone keyboard temperament in 1779 (die Kunst > des reinen Satzes in der Musik, Berlin) which is repeated in the > treatise of C. L. G. von Wiese (Dresden, 1793). All of these are > beyond the normally accepted terminus of the baroque period. Murray > Barbour states, "We are told that organs in England were still > generally in meantone temperament until the middle of the nineteenth > century." (p. 10) > > Daniel Heiman > -- > > To get on or off this list see list information at > http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html >