From dan.for@tiscali.cz Mon Dec 03 16:41:58 2012
Subject:Re: 30 yr old Korg BX3 question

As a specialist in temperaments, historical and ethnic tunings and
modern microtonality I can't agree with your statements.

Change of character could be true in the case of Middle Age mean
temperament, or Baroque unequal temperaments, or stretch tuning on
piano, but not in the case of modern 12-tone equal temperament. Still
we (un)happy owners of perfect pitch can hear some differences in the
sound for example of orchestra, string quartet or choir without piano
accompaniment (which can be even in Just temperament), but electronic
instruments use very close approximation of equal temperament, which
can't be distinguished - differences are less then 3 Cents. Truth is
that even such differences can have some very small impact on speed of
beating in chords, but we can't mention this in normal music
performance. It can be heard in laboratory conditions during tuning
research.

Hammond organ approximation of equal temperament belongs also here, see:

http://www.electricdruid.net/index.php?page=info.hammond

So sorry, but all keys, all chords sound the same. Maybe in the case
of some older samplers or romplers, hitting the Transpose button can
change timbre a little bit (due the transposition of samples - Mickey
mouse effect) but not the pitch relations.

Guitar is a different case. On the guitar there can be some
differences due to inaccuracies in fret positions, bridge position
(tuning of the octave!), string tension when pressed, tuning between
strings (usually G string is tuned little bit down), way of chord
voicing... Also the same note played in different position on the
other string has a different timbre. And chords with open strings tend
to have more bright color.

Bach didn't compose his Well Tempered Clavier in modern temperament
(if yes, it wouldn't show any differences between different major and
minor keys) - but in unequal Baroque temperament, with high
probability it's Werckmeister III. Scholars still quarrel about it and
there are more theories. In this tuning there are differences between
keys - simply said the more flats or sharps, it goes more out of tune.
Still it needs well trained ears, or perfect pitch to recognize.

Your statements about G and F major came from some kingdom of Romantic
music myths :-) It would be interested to know who started to spread
such nonsense, and which scientific, acoustic or psychoacoustic
research can support and prove it. But even pseudoscience created many
existing theories and some people believe in them. So it's more a
religion, not reality.

But you are right concerning the narrow relation between the key and
tactile control of instrument in tonal music - this exists. When some
music was composed on keyboard instrument in certain key, it's more
difficult to play it transposed to different key. Position of fingers
somehow could dictate the shape of music. There are also differences
between music composed on the guitar or on the keyboard - guitar
passages and riffs usually use four fingers, while keyboard music uses
five fingers. Also selection of keys differs - there's not so much
guitar pieces in Eb, but lot of in E, D, A. Key of Ebmi is quite easy
on the keyboard, especially when using pentatonic or blues scale,
which is often the case.

Daniel Forro

On 4 Dec, 2012, at 8:50 AM, mark k wrote: