source file: mills2.txt Date: Mon, 25 Sep 1995 22:22:57 -0700 Subject: Re: FWD: Bach's Tuning From: Paul Hahn On Sun, 24 Sep 1995, Aleksander Frosztega wrote: > Flat fifths were never mentioned in Rasch's quote. No, they weren't, were they? So what were you referring to when you said this a few articles back? "As pointed out by Prof. Rasch, Kirnberger admitted several times to Marpurg that Bach tuned each one of his fifths a bit flat." > But you are correct in > stating that Marpurg is wrong; What Marpurg probably meant to say was > that if all the major thids where to be made wide, a major third, wide by a > syntonic comma, was not possible. But this is _still_ incorrect. For example, consider a temperament in which five succesive fifths are tempered by 1/5 Pythagorean comma each, and the other seven just. In this tuning, all major thirds are wider than just, but it has no fewer than _four_ Pythagorean major thirds (wide by a syntonic comma). (It is curious to me that, while you insist the evidence is unambiguous, you resort to interpretations and speculations like this one and the one below.) [snip] > Kinberger himself, for all the polemics with Marpurg, remains silent on the > disposition of J.S. Bach's temperament. However, knowing Kirnberger, he > would have LEPT at the chance to publically humiliate Marpurg, were > Marpurg's original statement about J.S. Bach's temperament false (this > would follow the pattern of their famous vituperations). He didn't. It is > inconceivable that Kirnberger was unaware of the passage in question. > That is why we can probably trust that the quote represents correct > information. This is also the reason that you should not dismiss evidence > in Marpurg so quickly... So you'd rather trust Marpurg's slanted interpretation of Kirnberger's statements, even though he makes a whopping big theoretical error in it? Hmmph. The following two quotes are from _A History of Key Characteristics in the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries_, by Rita Steblin (UMI Research Press, 1983), already cited once in this thread. p.91: : It is known that Marpurg's attack caused Kirnberger much bitter : anguish: he poured out his vexation in a series of letters to Forkel : from 1779-80. . . . although Kirnberger did not publish a : counterattack himself, he did include a defense written by the : important mathematician and military officer at the Berlin court, : Georg Friedrich Tempelhof (1737-1807). p.92: : Marpurg, the avowed disciple of Rameau, had drawn clear battle lines : between his theories in support of equal temperament and those of : Kirnberger. Since the latter had declared that his primary intention in : _Die Kunst_ was to transmit the theoretical principles of J.S. Bach, : Marpurg's cruelest blow was the accusation that Kirnberger was not : faithful to Bach--not faithful because, as Marpurg contended, Bach had : actually taught Kirnberger to tune in equal temperament. Marpurg then : appealed to Bach's sons to substantiate him in his claim, but this ruse : backfired, and Kirnberger was able to end _Die Kunst_ with the following : passage taken from a letter that C.P.E. Bach had sent him: : : The conduct of Herr Marpurg against you is abominable. . . . You : may proclaim that my fundamental principles and those of my late : father are anti-Rameau. : : In this manner Kirnberger managed to get in a final blow. Although it : is not clear whether this quotation applies specifically to unequal : temperament and key characteristics, there is no reason to believe that : this topic--so important in Kirnberger's writing--should be excluded : from the anti-Rameauist principles espoused by the Bachs. --pH (manynote@library.wustl.edu or http://library.wustl.edu/~manynote) O /\ "Do you like to gamble, Eddie? -\-\-- o Gamble money on pool games?" Received: from eartha.mills.edu [144.91.3.20] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Tue, 26 Sep 1995 07:31 +0100 Received: from by eartha.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) for id WAA01350; Mon, 25 Sep 1995 22:30:55 -0700 Date: Mon, 25 Sep 1995 22:30:55 -0700 Message-Id: Errors-To: madole@ella.mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu