source file: m1476.txt Date: Wed, 15 Jul 1998 08:55:33 -0700 (PDT) Subject: From Dave Hill From: John Chalmers Forwarded from Dave Hill (ascend11@aol.com) by John Chalmers Subject: JI Piano vs. MT Piano My piano is retuned to have three chains of just fifths, one starting on Eb, one starting on G at a just major third above Eb, making the fifth C to G flat by 21.5 cents, and the third chain of fifths starting on B at a just major third above G. This tuning scheme could be conceptualized as a modified quarter comma MT tuning with the fifths from Eb to C made just and their quarter comma temperaments all shifted onto the single C to G fifth, etc. This scheme yields six just major triads - Eb, Bb, F and G, D, A, and six just minor triads - G, D, A and B, F sharp, C sharp. Although very limited, this is enough to permit a number of very simple tunes to be played with reasonable arrangements, together with some renaissance hymns. My piano tuner asked me to play some chords after he had completed the tuning job, which I did. To me at that point, the chords sounded quite clean, not very much different than they had sounded in 1/4 MT. As usual, the piano sounded somewhat dry, despite the unisons having been left slightly detuned by irregular amounts around a cent. My piano tuner was quite enthusiastic when he heard the chords and said that THAT was the first tuning he had done for me which really sounded good to him. I believe it is an important observation that he felt this way - liked the sound of the piano in JI but not so much in MT. Although the overall average degree of tempering of the thirds and fifths is much less in 1/4 MT than in EQT, I have become convinced that in comparison with just intonation, both EQT and 1/4 MT sound appreciably tempered, but the overall characters imparted to music in these two different temperaments as a result of the tempering are very different. Thus some musicians long accustomed to EQT are likely to be so accustomed to the effects of EQT that these sound completely natural to them. To them, I hypothesize, music on a piano in just intonation may sound different than what they are accustomed to hearing, but they will not find any new effects which add quote OFF unquote qualities to the music^Rs sound. They will immediately notice the greater flatness of the fifths in 1/4 MT than in EQT and find that to be disagreeable. In their aesthetic judgment, the fifths will be weighted much more heavily than the thirds. Nevertheless, there will be many others who, notwithstanding the greater off-ness of the 1/4 MT fifths, will weight the greatly increased harmoniousness of the thirds, together with the reduction in fast, high frequency beating and the markedly increased overall resonance of the piano more heavily than the moderately more perceptible off-ness of the fifths. I've been exploring the sounds of the piano in JI, and listening to earlier recordings made in 1/4 MT. I'm finding, not having expected it, that in comparison with the piano in JI, the 1/4 MT music has a definite quote CHARACTER unquote imparted to it by the appreciable tempering of the fifths. My personal sense is that it is the tempering of the fifths, equally as much as the justness of the thirds which gives the 1/4 comma music a certain solemn character, a certain deliberate weightiness or seriousness. Also, while after having always heard the piano in EQT, the beating resulting from 1/4 MT seemed essentially unnoticeable, in contrast with JI, there is a somewhat noticeable waveriness and shimmering effect discernible in 1/4 MT. There is a tendency for this to be especially noticeable in very high pitch registers. There seems to be an overall slightly dreamy flatness which isn't noticeable when one hears nothing but 1/4 MT music, but which is noticeable after one has been listening to JI piano music. To me, the shimmering and slight dreamy quality of the 1/4 MT music sometimes adds to the beauty of its sound, but perhaps not always. I find that with JI tuning, there is a definite improvement over 1/4 MT in the harmoniousness and beauty of minor chords and music having many minor harmonies. Also, where the upper voice forms a fifth - melodic especially - at an important point, the overall sound seems more like what one would expect, and to me better, with JI. At this point, I'd say that the change and improvement in going from EQT to 1/4 MT was greater for me than that in going from 1/4 MT to JI, but that there are quite a few differences between 1/4 MT and JI - minor harmonies, the fifths, melodic steps such as exact major semitones, neither wide nor narrow, just minor thirds, full major whole tones - which one begins to notice increasingly with time. I haven't found the JI piano tuning to be quote STIFLINGLY unquote restrictive, as textbooks usually state, but having only three adjacent usable keys (the bad C and E are problems) is sometimes frustrating.