linuxaudio.org

On 4/4/07, Paul Davis  wrote:

quoted text
> however, i can't agree about equal temperament. other tuning systems are

> not arbitrarily assigned, but are based on complex cultural and

> technological ideas. ET is a compromise not between nature and older

> ways of dividing up an octave, but between the simplicity of simpler

> tuning systems and the desire to modulate between modes. if you don't

> need to modulate between two or more modes, ET serves little purpose,

> which is why many musical traditions have not adopted it or anything

It also serves little purpose outside of fixed-pitch instruments, like

fixed-fretted strings or keyboard instruments; 12-tET Is very

difficult for string sections or a capella choirs to create, even when

they have been saturated with it.

We hear a just major third as being in tune, and no Centuries of ET

can change that.  Benade found that even trained musicians, on hearing

an isolated ET major third, reported that it was a "slightly sharp

third".
> if you're stuck in one mode. ET made it possible to modulate more or

quoted text
> less equally well between many different modes, and thus allowed what we

> broad-brush label as "classical" music to evolve. the fact that it was

> almost all in either 3 or 4 time and has the level of melodic complexity

> that 10 year could come up with is not relevant :)

Again, ET made it possible to do all this on fixed-pitch instruments.

The human voice can do it in any tuning system.
-Chuckk
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