Society of Arts Pitch

[adrian brown]

I was quite fascinated by the Society of Arts Pitch being described as a “botched attempt” in Bruce Haynes’ book, so I googled “Society of Arts Pitch” and found this as a first hit: HERE

 

It tells the whole sorry (but) interesting story over four consecutive web pages, which include the names of those on the committee (including a certain Prof. Wheatstone FRS), the proceedings, proposals, suggestions and aftermath. There was more to it than Haynes mentions – both the temperature issue and a lack of understanding about the problems you get if you try to calculate an A standard from a C pitch, without taking temperament into consideration.

There’s also this little gem, interesting for concertina players: (which doesn’t yet seem to have been posted here?)

 

"Is a uniform musical pitch possible?

1. With the first of these considerations the General Meeting were not long occupied, all testimony going to prove the frequent inconvenience* to which musical performers vocal and instrumental, musical instrument makers, musical directors, and even instructed hearers, were alike put by variation in the pitch, whether of individual instruments or of entire orchestras. The Meeting came early to a unanimous resolution that a uniform pitch was desirable.

(*One instance of this will suffice. An eminent performer acting on previous experience, provided himself for a recent musical tour with no less than thirteen concertinas, tuned to different pitches varying to the extent of about a tone and a half.)"

 

Anybody guesses who the “eminent performer” with thirteen concertinas was?

 

[Postscript I do apologise if this has all been gone through before here and is already in general circulation; I did have a good search through the forums using several of the terms mentioned and couldn’t find any references to it. I just don’t want to rub furs the wrong way already ]

 

Adrian

Edited December 18, 2011 by aybee

[JimLucas]

[Postscript I do apologise if this has all been gone through before here and is already in general circulation; I did have a good search through the forums using several of the terms mentioned and couldn’t find any references to it.

I don't recall seeing this particular detail before. Good on you for finding it.

 

(And even if it had been posted before, there's no need to apologize if you at least bothered to search and couldn't find it. The local Search facility has many faults.)

[wes williams]

Anybody guesses who the “eminent performer” with thirteen concertinas was?

 

A Mr Blagrove is listed on the third page. Could be him or possibly Regondi.

[adrian brown]

A Mr Blagrove is listed on the third page. Could be him or possibly Regondi.

 

Nah, it says near the bottom (under the heading "A fork!") that it's his brother, Henry Blagrove (the violinist) Unless of course they were both there... Reading these notes, I can almost hear the chinking of the brandy glasses through the cigar smoke!

 

Adrian

[Geoff Wooff]

And from this "Society of Arts" commitee findings one might assume that their "Diapason Normal" (being an anglification of the French term Diapason Nouveau) is the source of Lachenal's

"Normal" in their pitch listings ? So, Lachenal's Normal pitch means Continental Pitch I would think.

 

All very interesting indeed.

Edited December 19, 2011 by Geoff Wooff

[david fabre]

very interesting finding !

But regarding my previous post in the other thread, I'm pretty sure that mine was A=444 or 445, not 448.4.

It was rather in tune with itself, and according to my tuner, the temperament seemed equal.

 

On the other hand I've discovered that it could have been C=528Hz, which is THE FREQUENCY OF LOVE

[david fabre]

OOPS !

After reading more the site found by Adrian I discovered that C528 is precisely the society of arts pitch,

and that depending on the temperament it can imply either A440 or A444 !

 

Everything becomes clear at the fourth page :

http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/Society%20of%20Arts%20Pitch%20Outcome.htm

 

On the other hand I don't understand why, on the first page, it is first introduced as A448.4...

Edited December 23, 2011 by david fabre

[adrian brown]

David,

 

I also wondered where the a-448.4Hz had come from. Haynes mentions that the tuning fork made for the society was “nearer a-450Hz than 440Hz”, but doesn’t elaborate. However, looking at another interesting page on the same site “The Rise and Fall of English Pitch”, It mentions that the Society of Arts tuning fork made in 1860 was supposed to be in a-445Hz, but says it has actually been measured at a-448.4Hz!

On the same page there is also an interesting timeline showing various recorded pitches in England between 1750 and 1950.

 

Adrian

Edited December 23, 2011 by aybee

[david fabre]

I see again one inconsistency here (still in the fourth page on the society of arts)

 

"Ellis reconverts A445.7, using Equal Temperament, to get C534.5"

 

I beleive he actually used just intonation for the conversion.

I did the calculation :

using ET I find C529.7

using just intonation I find 534.6.

 

In any case it is sure that Ellis was aware of the temperament issue : he was the translator of Helmholtz' book

which deeply discusses the issue.

I beleive Ellis was also the inventor of the measure of intervals into "cents".

 

I may indicate this to the author of the page.