Musical questions and answers thread

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Sorry to point this out, Ferney, but you can't spell 'buggers'.

I can, but don't.

Of course. But t the folk singers I have in mind would rarely, if ever, have heard a piano.

Excellent point

[ahinton]

There's a scientist on a respected internet site who claims that "there's no such note as B#" - which rather beggurs up the "Moonlight Sonata".

Does he also claim that there's no such note as E#? Either way, he's presumably never tried to play the Moonlight Sonata, stll less the finale of Alkan's Concerto for solo piano...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Does he also claim that there's no such note as E#? Either way, he's presumably never tried to play the Moonlight Sonata, stll less the finale of Alkan's Concerto for solo piano...

Yes, he does (IIRC - he certainly says that there isn't an Fb). He's an amateur guitarist.

[BBMmk2]

There's a scientist on a respected internet site who claims that "there's no such note as B#" - which rather beggurs up the "Moonlight Sonata".

That’s most strange, Ferney. What was his thinking behind this?

[ahinton]

Yes, he does (IIRC - he certainly says that there isn't an Fb). He's an amateur guitarist.

Ah, well that explains everything! Presumably he'd likewise have no truck with the triple accidentals occasionally employed by Alkan and Ornstein (although, in the latter case, I can;t say that I'd entirely blam him because the notation schemes that Ornstein used in those days - the 1910s - made some of his music very difficult to read)...

[Richard Barrett]

Equal temperament with 72 pitches to the octave (twelfth-tones) is able to approximate to just intonation up to the eleventh harmonic (and therefore trivially to the twelfth) to within 5 cents, which is closer than most of us can hear under normal circumstances. I first came across this fact in the writings of the late great James Tenney.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

That’s most strange, Ferney. What was his thinking behind this?

To be fair to the man, it's probably best if I link to the actual lecture:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHSv94aTTnk

[Pabmusic]

Let alone an 'in tune' one.

Quite.

[vinteuil]

We are familiar with the solution, of course. Often called ‘equal temperament’, it is a system of tuning compromises that arose largely in the 17th and 18th centuries.

... "equal temperament" was of course only one of the solutions found. There were many 'good temperaments' found that suited various keys and pieces better than others, but which worked in all available keys. Early music keyboard players get used to negotiating their way around Werckmeister, Kirnberger, Vallotti, Rameau and others. The 'well tempered' keyboard of Bach's 48 is unlikely to have been in equal temperament.

.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werckmeister_temperament
.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kirnberger_temperament

.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vallotti_temperament

.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Well_temperament

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comma_(music)

.

[Richard Barrett]

The 'well tempered' keyboard of Bach's 48 is unlikely to have been in equal temperament.

Here is Bradley Lehman's rather fascinating account of his theory regarding the temperament of Bach's 48: http://www.larips.com/

Some other scholars regard it as too speculative, but to me it seems pretty convincing.

[Bryn]

Here is Bradley Lehman's rather fascinating account of his theory regarding the temperament of Bach's 48: http://www.larips.com/

Some other scholars regard it as too speculative, but to me it seems pretty convincing.

And you can hear the results in , for instance, Richard Egarr's recording of the 48. However, Bach's squiggles only appear on the title page of Book 1, so even if Lehman's solution is correct, might Bach not have changed his mind re. what tuning regime he favoured by the time he finished Book 2?

[Serial_Apologist]

Ah, well that explains everything! Presumably he'd likewise have no truck with the triple accidentals occasionally employed by Alkan and Ornstein (although, in the latter case, I can;t say that I'd entirely blam him because the notation schemes that Ornstein used in those days - the 1910s - made some of his music very difficult to read)...

Can you think of any explanation for uses of double, let alone triple accidentals, though? One assumes some deep theoretical reason for their use; but I was upset, on purchasing the score of Messiaen's early piano Préludes, to discover that, far from eschewing key signatures, a product of diatonic tonal relations, which to my mind would have validated his embrace of a modal approach to his harmonic and melodic thinking, not only did he go for the most difficult keys in these pieces, but in many places he indicated double sharps. What's wrong with a good old natural a single tone up was my opinion? This man wants to have his cake and eat it. In the end I gave them away to a professional pianist and friend.

[ahinton]

Can you think of any explanation for uses of double, let alone triple accidentals, though? One assumes some deep theoretical reason for their use; but I was upset, on purchasing the score of Messiaen's early piano Préludes, to discover that, far from eschewing key signatures, a product of diatonic tonal relations, which to my mind would have validated his embrace of a modal approach to his harmonic and melodic thinking, not only did he go for the most difficult keys in these pieces, but in many places he indicated double sharps. What's wrong with a good old natural a single tone up was my opinion? This man wants to have his cake and eat it. In the end I gave them away to a professional pianist and friend.

Messiaen's Préludes are wonderful pieces! - but they are very overtly tonal. The only need for double accidentals is when placing text in a specific tonal context; the same could be said of the mercifully far rarer triple ones although I suspect that it's far harder to justify these.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The only need for double accidentals is when placing text in a specific tonal context

Yes - such as a piece in E major which modulates to G# major: you'd need the Fx as a leading note for the modulation. (I had a student who once used precisely this modulation in one of his compositions - he wrote a series of about eight Gs alternating sharp and natural symbols in front of each. He was a pianist, of course.)

[jean]

I'm impressed that you continue your online argument, jean - I'd've made my polite excuses and left long before now...

Wise I am sure. But as can be seen elsewhere too, I am not very good at that.

And then, look what an interesting discassion my intransigence has spawned here!