low pitch

[Lawrence Reeves]

If low pitch on a German concert flute such as an old H.F. Meyer, or the like is A 435, were there any concertinas produced in the same? If so, would they have been in temper tuning, or just tuning?

[Larry Stout]

I think I remember a baritone EC from the 1850's that was on Concertina Connection's web site for a while that was in "German low pitch"-- the 435 HZ A sounds familiar. The instrument had appeared on e-Bay a couple of times as well. I was interested in a baritone at the time, but was a bit scared off by the price and pitch.

[Stephen Chambers]

If low pitch on a German concert flute such as an old H.F. Meyer, or the like is A 435, were there any concertinas produced in the same? If so, would they have been in temper tuning, or just tuning?

This could get extremely complicated, depending on the period and country you're talking about, as well as the system/type of concertina, but the simple answer is "yes, on all counts."

[Lawrence Reeves]

Alright Stephen, I see your point. I am trying to see if the old German flutes are really tuned mean tuned, vs tempered. Assuming that so many have been destroyed, miss repaired, or altered to try to make them louder etc, I am trying to establish a norm for the age. Terry McGee states on his website that many 19th century flutes must have been intended as mean toned. I have to assume that the orchestral players, and even the brass bands of the day that might have incorporated flutes would have been annoyed by the tuning standard difference. So if we look at Germany as the country of origin on melodeons, and mass produced instruments including flutes and concertinas, should we assume they were all mean tuned? I know I am stretching, but a conversation over beer with a friend that plays trumpet wondered if the old flutes of Germany were intended to be played with mean tuned instruments, and the larger holed flutes of England were first attempts for well tempered tuning.

[Stephen Chambers]

I know I am stretching, but a conversation over beer with a friend that plays trumpet wondered if the old flutes of Germany were intended to be played with mean tuned instruments, and the larger holed flutes of England were first attempts for well tempered tuning.

OMG! I think I might need a beer or three myself, to get into this one...

 

Where to begin?

 

Would I be correct in thinking that when you say "well tempered tuning", what you mean is equal-tempered tuning? (There is a common misconception that Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier was written for a keyboard in equal temperament, but they are not at all the same thing.)

 

"And the larger holed flutes of England were" simply intended to be louder, though the intonation of them did start to change mid-century after equal temperament became the accepted way of tuning a piano, just as the tuning of the English concertina did (which brings us neatly back to concertinas ).

Edited July 21, 2009 by Stephen Chambers

[TomB-R]

Alright Stephen, I see your point. I am trying to see if the old German flutes are really tuned mean tuned, vs tempered. Assuming that so many have been destroyed, miss repaired, or altered to try to make them louder etc, I am trying to establish a norm for the age. Terry McGee states on his website that many 19th century flutes must have been intended as mean toned. I have to assume that the orchestral players, and even the brass bands of the day that might have incorporated flutes would have been annoyed by the tuning standard difference. So if we look at Germany as the country of origin on melodeons, and mass produced instruments including flutes and concertinas, should we assume they were all mean tuned? I know I am stretching, but a conversation over beer with a friend that plays trumpet wondered if the old flutes of Germany were intended to be played with mean tuned instruments, and the larger holed flutes of England were first attempts for well tempered tuning.

 

Is "mean tuned" the same thing as meantone?

 

Isn't to be "well tempered" the aim of any form of tuning that comes between "just intonation" in a single key at one end of the spectrum and mathematically imposed equal temperament at the other.

 

I didn't realise that simple system flutes would be precise enough in tuning for anyone to be able to tell!

[JimLucas]

I didn't realise that simple system flutes would be precise enough in tuning for anyone to be able to tell!

A good flute player/flautist can shade the tuning of individual notes by subtly adjusting their embouchure, note for note.

[Anglo-Irishman]

If low pitch on a German concert flute such as an old H.F. Meyer, or the like is A 435, were there any concertinas produced in the same? If so, would they have been in temper tuning, or just tuning?

FWIW, I have a well-preserved but unrestored German Bandoneon dating from around 1900, and it's in low pitch. Last time the piano tuner was here, I got him to check it out, and it's at A=435.

 

In an earlier attempt to ascertain the pitch myself (which failed because my tuner can be calibrated up from A=440 but not down) I noticed that some notes were farther away from 440 pitch than others. However, harmonies using these notes sound "right".

 

So what I've got is an old German diatonic instrument pitched at A=435 and in some sort of unequal temperament.

 

Cheers,

John

[TomB-R]

I didn't realise that simple system flutes would be precise enough in tuning for anyone to be able to tell!

A good flute player/flautist can shade the tuning of individual notes by subtly adjusting their embouchure, note for note.

 

Exactly! They'll surely often have done so before they know they've done it, so wouldn't you need the flute to be blown mechanically to get pitch consistency of the sort needed to distinguish between temperaments?

(Happy to be told I'm wrong here, I just assume that pitch on a flute is almost as much player controlled as on a fiddle. No one worries about whether Baroque violins, of themselves, were in any given temperament! )

 

There's a story about the great French-Horn player Dennis Brain visiting an instrument factory and playing some of the horns into pitch testing equipment. The makers were amazed, they didn't think the horns were that good, but the truth was just that Brain was correcting the pitch too quickly for anyone else to notice.

(Nice story but I'm not too sure about it, for the same reasons as with the flutes!)

Edited July 21, 2009 by TomB-R

[Lawrence Reeves]

Yes, flute players do blow into tune, however the amount of fight we have to deal with varies from instrument to instrument. There is a standard of placing the tuning cork in the head-joint to achieve proper octaves, and overtones. On a flute I should be able to play an overtone with a note ie play a high a with low d fingering, and then open to the normal fingered high a and have an exact match. This is the same as what would happen on a guitar or mandolin playing a harmonic compared to the fretted sting. I is how we determine if the bridge s properly adjusted on a banjo etc. I have found a few German flutes that seem to be very sharp in the holes closest to the mouthpiece. A C natural fingered with the traditional 2nd and 3rd fingers of top hand should be same pitch as a key used to hit the C. My main reason for posting this here on C net is to try and come to a conclusion ( although far from scientific) as to what instruments may have been intended for mean or just tuning, and over the decades been either mechanically changed as in the concertina and accordions, vs played into tune. The ear corrects subtle things to match pitch, and I would like to experiment with playing a few tunes with an old pitch flute and an old pitch concertina or melodeon. I play regularly with an uilleann piper and I have no trouble matching the pitch of my flute to his chanter.