source file: mills3.txt Date: Fri, 5 Dec 1997 04:17:41 +0100 Subject: what "well temperament" means From: A440A Greetings< Carl writes: >There is the question of what "well temperament" means. I have most often >seen it used to mean "circular temperament" Circular temperament, as I understand it, is >any temperament where the sharps and flats are the same inside 12 >fifths Werckmeister, Kirnberger, Young, etc. Hmmm, I am not sure I understand the "same inside 12 fifths definition", could I ask for more clarification??? I would vote to use Well Temperament to describe the irregular, circulating, non-restrictive tunings that seemed to have begun with Werckmiester, and found perfection in the Young. This is a little looser definition that what I think Carl has described. Jorgensen writes: " they are unrestricticve, circulating temperaments allowing modulation thorugh all the keys without encountering wolf intervals". I think that a good definition of well temperament should include the lack of wolves, However, how shall we define wolf? anything more than a comma? Ronnie Milsap, (who had his other tuner come retune his piano the day after I introduced him to Mr Young), started calling "wolf" at about 18 cents in the maj3rd........... Also, Jorgensen writes " the varying sizes of major thirds are placed in strict order, whereby they change regularly in patterns from smallest to largest and back to smallest while modulating through a series of fourths or fifths around the circle. The form of tonality in these irregular temperaments is , therefore, regular. " This is an important distinction. Many musicians think the irregular temperaments just scattered differing levels of dissonance around, willy- nilly, and you never know what a key might sound like. In fact, virtually all of the writings about tunings in the Well Tempered era, ( which I am taking to be 1700-1850) seem to refer to this form, and it is logical to assume that composers were using the same basic set of resources in tunings. How do I see it? Meantone forces black and white decisions on enharmonic choices, the Well Temperaments demand a predictable palette of tempering gradations, ( which I call a "Harmonic Toolbox"),. and 12 TET doesn't let you make any choices at all....... Regards, Ed Foote Precision Piano Works Nashville, Tn SMTPOriginator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu From: mr88cet@texas.net (Gary Morrison) Subject: Re: Bach again PostedDate: 05-12-97 15:57:58 SendTo: CN=coul1358/OU=AT/O=EZH ReplyTo: tuning@eartha.mills.edu $MessageStorage: 0 $UpdatedBy: CN=notesrv2/OU=Server/O=EZH,CN=coul1358/OU=AT/O=EZH,CN=Manuel op de Coul/OU=AT/O=EZH RouteServers: CN=notesrv2/OU=Server/O=EZH,CN=notesrv1/OU=Server/O=EZH RouteTimes: 05-12-97 15:56:09-05-12-97 15:56:10,05-12-97 15:56:01-05-12-97 15:56:02 DeliveredDate: 05-12-97 15:56:02 Categories: $Revisions: Received: from ns.ezh.nl ([137.174.112.59]) by notesrv2.ezh.nl (Lotus SMTP MTA SMTP v4.6 (462.2 9-3-1997)) with SMTP id C1256564.00520A17; Fri, 5 Dec 1997 15:56:05 +0100 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA07174; Fri, 5 Dec 1997 15:57:58 +0100 Date: Fri, 5 Dec 1997 15:57:58 +0100 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA07171 Received: (qmail 3669 invoked from network); 5 Dec 1997 06:57:55 -0800 Received: from localhost (HELO ella.mills.edu) (127.0.0.1) by localhost with SMTP; 5 Dec 1997 06:57:55 -0800 Message-Id: Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu