'Sib. 6.1: Temperament'

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Sib. 6.1: Temperament - mben77, 07 Nov 01:56AM
     Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Wim Hoogewerf, 07 Nov 08:56AM
         Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Michael Casey, 07 Nov 09:46AM
             Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - David Hitchin, 07 Nov 10:14AM
             Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Rob Tuley, 07 Nov 10:17AM
     Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Laurence Payne, 07 Nov 02:53PM
         Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Norbert Gerl, 07 Nov 03:22PM
         Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Rob Tuley, 07 Nov 05:22PM
             Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Laurence Payne, 07 Nov 05:31PM
                 Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Majongdit, 17 Feb 05:11PM

Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by mben77 - 07 Nov 01:56AM
This might seem like a silly question, but is Sibelius set to play in equal temperament?

Is there a setting (or, perhaps, a midi control) by which I could set, for instance, all of the A's in the score to playback at A=442 without going through and manually bending the pitch for each individual note? I would like to be able to set up and play back learning tracks for singers that use just intonation, as well as having an organ play back with, say, a Werckmeister temperament.

A plug-in that did this might be a nice option, as well...
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Wim Hoogewerf - 07 Nov 08:56AM
Sibelius plays back in equal temperament at A=440. You can certainly « fine tune » a score by adding specific MIDI commands (ask for details!). MIDI commands work per staff and are dependent on their rhythmical position. Therefor you can't fine tune a vertical stack of notes on the same staff.
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Michael Casey - 07 Nov 09:46AM
To answer your second question there are a number of programs out there Amazing Slow Downer and Garageband for example where you can change the overall pitch by small or large amounts. As regards temperament, Wim gave you a good answer.
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by David Hitchin - 07 Nov 10:14AM
If it is organ music that you are interested - and perhaps this is the area in which temperament is most important, then you can use Hauptwerk as a Sibelius playback device, with access to a number of historic temperaments. See
http://www.hauptwerk.com/
There is a lite version which is free.
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Rob Tuley - 07 Nov 10:17AM
You can't do this with pitch bend commands except for monophonic instruments, as Wim said. You need to send a set of instructions to the sample player to redefine the playback temperament from ET to something else.

This is usually done with System Exclusive messages that are specific to each sample player. I don't know if this is possible with the "free" Kontakt Player (as compared with the full Kontakt) or the new Sibelius player. You can send System Exclusive messages from Sibelius (see Midi Messages in the reference) if your sample player can act on them.

There is a software package called Scala which seems to be emerging as a "standard" for defining temperaments in a sample-player-independent way.

Changing the overall pitch (e.g. from A440 to A442) is a different question. You can do that with the Kontakt Player control panel.

--
Rob

Sib 4.1, Win98SE, Athlon 3100, 512Mb, Audigy
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Laurence Payne - 07 Nov 02:53PM
On Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:56:33, "mben77" <[email protected]> wrote:

>This might seem like a silly question, but is Sibelius set to play in equal temperament?
>
>
>Is there a setting (or, perhaps, a midi control) by which I could set, for instance,
>all of the A's in the score to playback at A=442 without going through and manually
>bending the pitch for each individual note? I would like to be able to set up
>and play back learning tracks for singers that use just intonation, as well as
>having an organ play back with, say, a Werckmeister temperament.
>
>A plug-in that did this might be a nice option, as well...

Get yourself a MIDI playback device that supports different tuning
schemes. My old Yamaha SY99 keyboard offered this, as did several
Yamaha sound modules of that era. I've not seen it on newer gear.
Maybe because it's easier to implement in FM-based synthesis than in
sample playback. Maybe because I haven't been looking for it!

(...having gone and looked...)

I see my nice new Kurzweil PC3X offers tuniing maps. So I'm sure
other current (and cheaper!) gear will too.
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Norbert Gerl - 07 Nov 03:22PM
the Aria player in Garritan Personal Orchestra 4 (GPO 4) let's you do everything you are asking for. And easily.
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Rob Tuley - 07 Nov 05:22PM
> My old Yamaha SY99 keyboard offered this, as did several
Yamaha sound modules of that era. I've not seen it on newer gear. Maybe because it's easier to implement in FM-based synthesis than in sample playback. Maybe because I haven't been looking for it!

Implmenting it is no different in principle from using one sample to play several different notes. The temperament could be set on both of the (ancient) Roland GS and Yamaha XG "standards".

However the idea starts to fall apart with modern "realistic" sample libraries. If you tune the samples in the library precisely to equal temperament, you knock all the stuffing out of the sound. If you don't tune them precisely, then tweaking the tuning by tiny intervals might produce something that sounds "interesting" but it's unlikely to correspond to any particular historical temperament.

Historical temperaments were not so much mathematical exercises that produced tables of frequencies to 3 decimal places (though the people who found it interesting wrote plenty of abstruse mathematics on the subject), but practical recipes for tuning real physical instruments. The end result depends as much on the instrument and the tuner (human, with no measuring instruments except two ears) as on the recipe itself. Real instruments don't understand mathematics. Note 1 can sound exactly in tune with note 2, and note 2 exactly in tune with note 3, but notes 1 and 3 played together sound obviously out of tune. Sample libraries mostly don't even try to model reality at that level of detail.

--
Rob

Sib 4.1, Win98SE, Athlon 3100, 512Mb, Audigy
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Laurence Payne - 07 Nov 05:31PM
Even on my old Yamaha FM boxes, I only found different tunings interesting when played on very pure sounds - typically an electric piano.

>Note 1 can sound exactly in tune with note 2, and note 2 exactly in >tune with note 3, but notes 1 and 3 played together sound obviously >out of tune

Which is, I suppose, a succinct argument for equal temperament! Once A has to serve, in rapid sequence, not only as the 6th from C but also the 5th from D and the 3rd from F it becomes just about inevitable.
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Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament
Posted by Majongdit - 17 Feb 05:11PM
Depending on one's degree of seriousness (or "passion") with regard to this matter of tuning and "historical" temperaments, one might wish to consult Hermann Helmholtz' 19th century tome, "On the Sensations of Tone as a Physiological Basis for the Theory of Music" (an English translation reprint is available from Dover).

Observe specifically the several sections (and Appendices) on Temperament, Bosanquet's "Cycle of 53," musical "Duodenes," and the "Duodenarium."
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Messages in this thread

Sib. 6.1: Temperament - mben77, 07 Nov 01:56AM
     Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Wim Hoogewerf, 07 Nov 08:56AM
         Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Michael Casey, 07 Nov 09:46AM
             Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - David Hitchin, 07 Nov 10:14AM
             Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Rob Tuley, 07 Nov 10:17AM
     Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Laurence Payne, 07 Nov 02:53PM
         Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Norbert Gerl, 07 Nov 03:22PM
         Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Rob Tuley, 07 Nov 05:22PM
             Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Laurence Payne, 07 Nov 05:31PM
                 Re: Sib. 6.1: Temperament - Majongdit, 17 Feb 05:11PM