or A is
a whole tone or minor 3rd below a' = 440. The only difference is that
today the existence of a single standard (a' = 440) is assumed, so some
instruments are thought of as ‘transposing’ and others ‘in concert pitch’.The particular quality of a sound (e.g. an individual musical note) that fixes its position in the scale. Certain sounds used in music that occupy no particular scale position, such as those produced by cymbals or the side drum, can be said to be of indefinite pitch. Pitch is determined by what the ear judges to be the most fundamental wave-frequency of the sound (even when, as for example with difference tones, this is an aural illusion, not actually present in the physical sound wave). Experimental studies, in which listeners have been tested for their perception and memory of pitch differences among sounds with wave-frequencies known to the experimenter, have shown that marked differences of timbre, loudness and musical context affect pitch, albeit in relatively small degree. But long-term memory, called Absolute pitch, enables some people to identify the pitch of sounds quite apart from their contextual relation to other sounds. Such aspects of pitch are discussed in Psychology of music, §II, 1.
Pitch is expressed by combining a frequency value (such as 440 Hz) with a note name. a' = 440 Hz is a pitch, as is g' = 440. If g' is 440, in equal temperament, then a' will be 494 Hz; if a' = 440, g' will be 392 Hz. Frequencies and pitches by themselves are simply natural phenomena; it is only when they are connected to pitch standards that they take on a musical dimension. A pitch standard is a convention of uniform pitch that is understood, prescribed and generally used by musicians at a given time or place. The statement ‘Cammerton was at a' = 415’, for example, combines the name of a pitch standard (Cammerton or ‘chamber pitch’) with a note-name (a') and a frequency (415 Hz). Over the last 400 years in Europe, the point that has been considered optimal for pitch standards has varied by about six semitones, depending on time and place.
This article discusses the pitch standards that have been used in various places and periods in Europe. The concept of pitch standards and attempts to measure pitch systems in non-Western music are also discussed.
II. Non-Western and traditional concepts
BRUCE HAYNES (I), PETER R. COOKE (II)
1. Introduction: historical pitch standards.
2. History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century.
Pitch, §I: Western pitch standards
Pitch
standards were not an issue until voices and instruments began playing
together. Singers performing a cappella found their pitch according to
the compass of a given piece and the range of their voices. Consorts of
instruments were tuned together, but only in reference to themselves. Until the
second half of the 16th century, the only instrument that was played in church
music was the organ (which even then played only alternatim passages).
When secular instruments such as the violin and cornett finally entered the
church, pitch standards had to be agreed upon. But the universal standard that
we now take for granted was not yet necessary, and different standards operated
side by side. In effect this practice survives today in so-called Transposing
instruments
such as horns, saxophones and clarinets. An 18th-century hautboy at Cammerton
was a whole tone or minor 3rd below the organ at Cornet-Ton, just as a modern
clarinet in B or A is
a whole tone or minor 3rd below a' = 440. The only difference is that
today the existence of a single standard (a' = 440) is assumed, so some
instruments are thought of as ‘transposing’ and others ‘in concert pitch’.
As instruments (particularly wind instruments) travelled, they took their pitches with them. In the 16th and early 17th centuries wind instrument making was highly centralized: the best woodwinds came from Venice, the best brass from Nuremberg. The resulting consistency in pitch over large parts of Europe compared strikingly to the fragmentation that occurred during the Baroque and Classical periods. Since about 1830, with the standardization of the Industrial Revolution, deviations in pitch standards have again become relatively small (which is probably why it was possible eventually to agree on a universal standard at the International Standardizing Organization (ISO) meeting in London in May 1939, confirmed in 1953. There had been international meetings in 1834, 1858, 1862 and 1885, and laws fixing pitch have been passed in Italy in 1887, 1936 and 1888). The present level is about the same as it was in Beethoven's day.
There is little evidence to support the theory that differing pitches were the result of local length standards. Organ builders speak of ‘5 1/3' pitch’ and so on as if pitch and length were almost synonymous, but such terms are not always meant literally. The known length standards of a number of European cities bear no obvious relation to their pitch standards, and some cities, like Nuremberg, show an almost continuous range of pitches, depending on the period. Many makers also copied instruments from other places.
It is rarely possible to generalize about pitch standards. Even when the exact period and location are known, different kinds of music often had their own standards (reflected in names such as ‘opera pitch’, ‘chamber pitch’ and ‘choir pitch’). Although the levels shifted with time, the breaks were rarely clean, so older standards overlapped with newer ones.
Among the most important early writings on pitch history were those by the 19th-century English philologist and mathematician Alexander Ellis. He provided a great quantity of raw data but, lacking a body of practical knowledge of how music had been performed in the past, he was able to give little indication of how it had been used by musicians. Many of Ellis's pitches, calculated to a tenth of Hertz, appear to be more accurate than a careful reading of his text allows, and most later writers have accepted them too literally. It was the 20th-century American musicologist Arthur Mendel who clarified the way musicians thought about pitch, as a series of standards that sometimes related to each other in transposable intervals (Chorton was a major 2nd above Cammerton, for instance). He also emphasized the importance of both place and date in discussing standards. Despite Mendel's rigorous approach to the subject, however, he gave few absolute values for the relative standards he discussed, and those that he gave were usually conditional. Thus, between the extremes of Ellis's pitch frequencies without names and Mendel's pitch standards without values, performing musicians found little practical guidance.
Until the latter part of the 20th century, in fact, there was no great urgency to know the absolute Hertz values of historical pitches. As a practical matter they affected only singers, who whenever they sang with instruments either accepted the standard a' = 440 or persuaded the instrumentalists to transpose for them. The increase of performances on period instruments led to wider acceptance of the possibility of using pitches different to the modern standard, and to a realization that the sonorities and playing techniques of period instruments depended on their pitch levels. It thus became vital to know the performing pitches of works such as the cantatas of J.S. Bach, in which the original parts to the same piece were sometimes written in different keys (see §3(iv) below).
As the techniques of playing, making and restoring early instruments have become better understood, they have provided an important new source of empirical information on pitch that, if carefully approached, enables us to make plausible reconstructions of pitch levels as far back as the late Renaissance. The instruments that yield the most reliable historical pitch data are those that are hardest to alter: cornetts, early flutes, recorders, clarinets and organs. Other instruments are too flexible to be used as direct evidence: pitch estimates based on vocal ranges and string tension, for example, have proven unreliable except as corroboration of other kinds of evidence (written descriptions, musical notation, records of travelling musicians, etc.). Some early pitchpipes and tuning-forks survive, but it is difficult to know whether, when and how most of them were used. A few individual instruments (often organs) still exist whose pitches not only survive but were described at the time they were built. Other instruments can plausibly be associated with named pitch standards (for instance, recorders made in Leipzig with Bach's Cammerton). However, a number of factors can distort pitch evidence, such as the context in which each instrument was used, temperature (which is important for organs but is solved by a warm-up period on woodwinds), physical alterations, wood shrinkage, nominal pitch (e.g. whether the instrument is in F at a' = 440 or in G at a' = 392), location and date of manufacture, temperament, quality of information and modern assumptions about technique. The sections that follow are based on a study of the pitches of 1,194 original instruments that give plausible information, reported in Haynes, 1995.
Musicians today, playing music from a vast range of times and places, normally identify pitch standards by Hertz values. This convention breaks down when a' = 415, for instance, is used in a generic sense to mean all pitch frequencies from, say, a' = 410 to 420 Hz. A pitch standard is a musical rather than an acoustical unit, however; in terms of single cycles per second pitch changes radically during concerts, but is nevertheless acceptable to those listening. Hertz values are too specific to represent pitch standards; in fact, our vocabulary lacks a terminology appropriate to this subject. In this article pitches are identified by note names: a' = 440 (or thereabouts) is given as A+0; a semitone lower as A–1; a major 2nd above as A+2, and so on. This system helps to visualize transpositions, which are an integral factor in the discussion of pitch, and accommodates the physical reality that although they start by tuning in the same frequency, most instruments are not tuned to an exact Hertz value but rather to a pitch standard. These standards are identified by semitones, a tolerance of half that size (i.e. plus or minus a quarter-tone, or 50 cents) being understood.
Pitch, §I: Western pitch standards
(vii) Classical pitches, 1765–1830.
(viii) Pitch standards since c1830.
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
Mezzo punto and tutto punto were the names of pitch standards associated with the cornett, violin and organ in northern Italy from about 1580 to the end of the 17th century. Mezzo punto, clearly the more common level, was at a' ≈ 464 (A+1), tutto punto was at a' ≈ 440 (A+0). Church choirs of the period usually performed at A–1, a pitch known as tuono corista. Certain soft-voiced instruments such as transverse flutes and mute cornetts were also associated with this pitch. Organs were most often tuned at mezzo punto for playing with instruments, and organists transposed down a major 2nd when accompanying singers. Because temperaments and fingering technique made semitone transpositions impractical, wind players may have owned several instruments pitched in consecutive semitones, allowing whole-tone transpositions in various combinations to produce any required scale.
String players probably tuned up or down in order to play in reasonable keys. Most string instruments made in Cremona were probably designed to be played at mezzo punto or tutto punto. Antonio Barcotto (1652) wrote: ‘Organs that are high work well with lower voices and violins, which are for this reason more spirited. The lower-pitched organs … do not work as well with violins as the high organs’. The gut strings used on the larger sizes of violin could probably have been tuned at least as high as A+1; smaller violins (which were especially popular in the 17th century) could go a semitone higher. Instrumental music was thus performed at A+1 or, less commonly, A+0; music involving choirs was at A–1 or, less commonly, at A+0.
By the 18th century, mezzo punto at A+1 was generally being called corista di Lombardia; it was the normal pitch of church organs in Venice until about 1740, when the organ maker Pietro Nachini began using A+0 (tutto punto), which then became known as corista Veneto. Although A–1 was used in Venetian opera in the early part of the century, it was A+0, apparently regarded as a compromise, that was to remain the principal pitch in Venice throughout the century, and which was adopted as the standard instrumental pitch, firstly in Vienna, and then all over Europe by the end of the 18th century. San Petronio in Bologna, which had been at mezzo punto since 1531, moved down to corista Veneto in 1708. Thus, the 20th-century pitch standard of a' = 440 may ultimately be descended from corista Veneto.
Tuono corista at A–1 still had currency in northern Italy during the 18th century; surviving Italian woodwinds were made at this level (as well as A+0). J.M. Anciuti and Carlo Palanca, who were among the important makers, made flutes with alternate joints at both levels, as well as individual recorders at each. Naples and Florence were generally associated with a pitch at A–1 during much of the 18th century.
In Rome, organs were generally at A–1 in Palestrina's time. But about 1600, evidently for the sake of the new castratos, church organs were lowered to A–2 (about a' = 384). One source called this pitch corista di S Pietro. Some Roman organs stayed at this level until late in the 19th century. Evidently, strings also played at this low pitch. Hautboy parts written by Handel and Antonio Caldara in Rome are notated a major 2nd lower than those for the rest of the orchestra, indicating that the hautboys involved were pitched a major 2nd higher. The principal hautboist for most or all these pieces was Ignazio Rion, who had come from Venice (where he had taught at the Ospedale della Pietà along with Vivaldi). Rion was evidently playing an hautboy at corista Veneto, while the other instruments (led by Arcangelo Corelli) were at A–2.
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
Mersenne wrote that a normal pitchpipe was tuned to ton de chapelle, presumably the pitch associated with church organs and choirs. The known pitches of most large organs built in France before 1680 range from a' = 388 to a' = 396 (A–2); this was the principal level associated with organs in France right into the 19th century. According to Mersenne's dimensions and illustrations of the 1630s, French wind instruments (which in this period never played in church) were at a level similar to the Italian mezzo punto (A+1). In France it was called Ton d'écurie, and woodwinds continued to be made to it until the 18th century (hence the C-hautboys that appear to be ‘in D’ and the F-recorders ‘in G’). But most woodwinds were played at two other pitch standards: Ton de l'Opéra and Ton de la chambre. The orchestra of the new Opéra, created in the second half of the 17th century, adopted the singer's Ton de chapelle at A–2, and called it Ton de l'Opéra. To include winds in the new orchestra required that they be fundamentally redesigned, since (among other reasons) up to that time they had functioned separately in consorts at A+1. Pitch at the Opéra was fixed by the repertory: as long as works by Lully continued to be performed, a change in Ton de l'Opéra would have affected voice ranges and was therefore out of the question. The Opéra may have owned its own instruments and lent them to its players.
Several authors described two separate instrumental pitches in France from the late 17th century. In 1698, Georg Muffat reported one called ‘ordinaire’ and another approximately a semitone lower that he associated with ‘Teatralischen Sachen’. Guillaume-Gabriel Nivers in 1683 also distinguished ‘Ton de la Chambre du Roy’ from Ton de chapelle a semitone lower. This Ton de la chambre, or ‘court’ pitch, seems to have been a' ≈ 404 (A–1½); it is the pitch of many surviving French woodwinds of the period, of some organs, and of many French folk instruments. The name Ton de la chambre was used by other writers, including Loulié (1696) and Brossard (1703). Joseph Sauveur measured the pitches of harpsichords in 1700 and 1713 at a' ≈ 404. This level is observable in France from about 1680 to 1800, although its period of importance was the reign of Louis XIV. The same frequency was dominant in England in the same period, and was known there as ‘consort-pitch’.
There is evidence that all the royal organs (and some others as well) were raised from Ton de chapelle (A–2) to Ton de la chambre at A–1½ in the 1680s. This may have occurred because court musicians regularly performed in the royal chapels. Organs in other churches did not need to be changed in pitch to accomodate other instrumentalists, since there was a general interdiction on ‘symphonists’ playing in church (and when on special occasions they did, they usually came from the Opéra). Later in the 18th century the royal organs (like the one in the chapel at Versailles) were tuned back down to A–2. The organ at St Gervais, for example, where François Couperin was organist, was built in 1601 at A–2, and was raised a semitone in 1676 by Alexandre Thierry, organ maker to the King. In 1768 it was lowered to its original pitch of A–2. Thus all of Couperin's music, written either for St Gervais or the royal organs, and all his chamber music written for the court, was probably conceived at Ton de la chambre (A–1½).
Many woodwinds from Couperin's period survive at A–2 as well, and not all of them could have been used in the Opéra orchestra. Both A–1½ and A–2 were evidently current. Starting in the second decade of the 18th century French woodwinds began to be made at another somewhat higher pitch: a' = 410–415, or A–1. The term Ton de la chambre is not mentioned in later French sources. In 1737, Jacques Hotteterre was using Ton ordinaire for instrumental pitch (presumably A–1).
Pitch standards, like other aspects of French music making, changed rapidly after the death of Louis XIV in 1715. A–1 apparently became the predominant woodwind pitch until the 1740s, but this was the period when Italian style overwhelmed the traditional French, and corista Veneto came in at the same time; flutes were already appearing at A+0. In 1752, Quantz reported that Parisian pitch was ‘beginning almost to equal that of Venice’, and in 1757 J.F. Agricola spoke of ‘französischen Stimmung’ (by which he meant a' ≈ 390) as a thing of the past. French flutes at A–2 no longer appeared after about 1770. From the time woodwinds at A+0 became common, they may have been used as transposing instruments at the Opéra (within the prevailing standard of A–2. Although this is mere speculation, that would explain the extreme sharp keys and difficult high notes in the woodwind parts to Rameau's operas starting in the 1740s.). The Concert Spirituel was also known for its high pitch. A number of well-known wind soloists from abroad played there starting in the 1730s, and may have influenced pitch through the instruments they brought with them.
By the 1760s Ton de chapelle, which had been ambiguous during Louis XIV's reign, was again fixed at its old level of A–2. But both Dom Bedos de Celles and Rousseau reported that Ton de l'Opéra was no longer stable, being raised and lowered a quarter-tone or more, depending on the ranges of voices. Repertory also played a part: Lully's works now began to undergo major revisions and additions which may have affected the ranges required from the singers and thus influenced their pitch preferences. The works of Lully and Rameau were still being performed in the early 1770s, but Gluck's ‘reform operas’ began in 1774, and from 1778 new and old operas were performed alternately. It was probably this state of affairs that the first bassoonist at the Opéra, Pierre Cugnier, described in 1780:
Bassoons that are made in the proportion of eight feet reduced to four, according to the old system of manufacture, are appropriate for playing in cathedrals, where ordinarily the pitch of the organ is very low, as was that of the Eglise des Innocents and is still Ste Chapelle at Paris and the Chapelle du Roi in Versailles. These bassoons can still be used in the Paris Opéra, where one changes pitch when the solo voice parts are lower or less high; so that there are of necessity some problems with intonation caused by the difficulty (one can even say the impossibility) of playing in tune with an instrument that is too high or too low.
In the same year that Cugnier's comments were published, an anonymous tract gave the pitch of the Opéra as a' ≈ 404, or A–1½, which was probably preferred for the newer repertory.
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
The detailed pitch information in Praetorius's De organographia of 1618 is pivotal, looking back on the practices of the end of the 16th century and forward to the situation of German musicians confronted with the arrival of the new French orchestral instruments in the later 17th. But (although Praetorius was not confused) his terminology is confusing. He called his reference pitch CammerThon (which he used to mean ‘secular instrumental pitch’ at A+1), but its frequency was quite different from that of 18th- century Cammerton. Praetorius used ChorThon to mean ‘church organ pitch’. Earlier this pitch had been a tone lower than his CammerThon, thus A–1, and in certain places, he said, it still was. But ChorThon was in process of changing in Praetorius's day. He explained that organs had gradually risen in pitch ‘about a tone’ until they too were at CammerThon. This is why Praetorius was inconsistent in his meaning of the term ChorThon, sometimes equating it to CammerThon and sometimes making it a major 2nd below it. (Fortunately, he reserved CammerThon as his unmoving reference, although he gave it other names as well, like rechte Thon and Cornettenthon.) Praetorius described with approval the situation in Prague:
Normal modern pitch, to which nearly all of our organs are now tuned, is there called CammerThon … ChorThon, however, which is a whole tone lower, is used only in the churches, primarily for the sake of the singers … as it allows their voices to bear up longer, and saves them from becoming husky from working at high pitch.
Evidence from the Habsburg lands confirms his description, ChorThon being the usual term for a pitch a 2nd below A+1 (Zinck-Thon or Cornet-Ton) until at least the time of Janowka (Prague, 1701; see §I, 2(v) below). Praetorius also appears to have been describing a corollary to the system used in northern Italy, in which the organist transposed down a whole step (to tuono corista or A–1) from a high instrumental pitch (A+1) for the sake of the singers. The parallel is underlined by Praetorius's use of the phrase ‘Chöristen- oder ChorThon’.
Another aspect of Praetorius's pitch information that has led to confusion is his scale diagram of a set of organ pipes, or Pfeifflin zur Chormass, whose principal purpose, he explained, was to indicate the pitch level of his CammerThon. This diagram has been the subject of considerable debate, but it is now generally agreed that it, like other indications (including extant original wind instruments of the period), shows a level at A+1 (Myers, A1997, and Koster, D forthcoming). Praetorius's CammerThon was thus parallel to the most common pitch in Italy at the same time, mezzo punto.
In the latter part of the 17th century developments in France inspired a revolution in the instrumentarium in Germany. The new designs of woodwinds were tuned a tone or more below most German organs. For various practical reasons, neither the organs nor the woodwinds could adapt to each other's pitch for a period of several generations. As secular instrumental music gradually came to dominate music making, however, so did its pitch. Thus Praetorius's CammerThon effectively swapped its meaning with that of Chorton (which continued to mean ‘church organ pitch’). Jakob Adlung in 1768 referred to this confusion, writing that ‘organs are tuned to Chorton, as it is now called, which is 1 or 1½ tones higher than Cammerton. Formerly it was the reverse, and Cammerton was higher than Chorton; organs were tuned to what was then called Cammerton’. Thus the approximate frequencies of established German pitch standards (A+1 and A–1) were not altered by the musical revolution caused by the arrival of French orchestral instruments, but their names were interchanged.
In the new configuration, transposition became necessary when organs played with other instruments. Vocal parts could be notated at either standard. In some cases, it was simpler (as for Bach at Weimar) to notate the voices with the organ, since the strings were still tuned high. As time went on, it became more common to write voice and string parts at the new low Cammerton (as Bach did at Leipzig), leaving only the organ and the brass (the latter representing a stronghold of tradition) at Chorton.
The older instruments in the German 17th-century tradition did not vanish immediately. The chorist-Fagott or deutsche Fagott (i.e. the curtal) long continued its traditional role in providing discrete accompaniment to choirs, and traditional shawms were played well into the 18th century. These instruments were pitched at Praetorius's old high CammerThon at A+1. But since the word Cammerton was now associated with a low pitch, ‘deutsche’ (e.g. deutsche Schalmey) gradually developed a secondary connotation as an indication of instruments at high pitch. Just as the term ‘French’ before an instrument's name (französische Schalmei), or the use of the French name itself (Hautbois) was a sign of an instrument in Cammerton, the word ‘deutsche’ was used to indicate an instrument at A+1 (see Shawm, §4).
We are fortunate in having the original frequencies of at least 36 German organs whose pitch standard was also identified by name:
There are 13 examples of Cornet-Ton within a narrow and specific range, averaging a' = 463. This level agrees well with the pitch of surviving cornetts.
There are 11 examples of Chorton, as high as a' = 487 and as low as a' = 437 (i.e. A+0, A+1, A+2). They average, however, a' = 467.
There are two examples of Chormass at a' = 489 and a' = 466. (Chormass is a term frequently encountered in the 17th century and less in the 18th; it was evidently synonymous with Chorton).
Cammerton (ten examples) is also consistent and averages a' = 416. This level compares well with woodwind pitch between 1680 and 1770.
From this it can be seen that Chorton in the 18th century could have been any pitch from A+0 to A+2. 18th-century Cornet-Ton, by contrast, was relatively specific and consistent in frequency. Cornetts were commonly used as a reference for pitch frequency in Italy, Germany and the Habsburg lands. Cornetts made in Germany in the 16th and 17th centuries range in pitch from a' = 450 to a' = 480, but most are close to a' = 465.
Praetorius used CammerThon and Cornettenthon synonymously in the early 17th century. But while the names CammerThon and ChorThon traded places between the 17th and 18th centuries, Cornet-Ton (Cornettenthon) remained at the same level, since cornetts did not change in pitch from the 16th to the 18th centuries. Cornet-Ton, then, was equivalent to the early 17th-century CammerThon, but by the 18th century it had become a specific kind of Chorton.
The words Cornet-Ton and Chorton sounded so similar, and the concepts they denoted overlapped so closely, that it would be surprising if they had not sometimes been confused. Chorton was variously described as different from, lower than, and equal to Cornet-ton. Because Chorton was a general concept rather than a specific frequency, there are a number of references to a ‘gewöhnlichen (ordinairen) Chortone’ and ‘hohe Chortone’. The ‘gewöhnlichen’ was a whole-tone above Cammerton (which was A–1). Hohe Chorton was found in the extreme north of Germany: Buxtehude's organ at the Marienkirche, Lübeck, was in hoch-Chorton and pitched at A+2. About a third of the surviving organs by Arp Schnitger are at A+2 (the others are at A+1). Organs at A+2 were used to accompany congregational singing in churches that did not use other instruments.
There were those who preferred the sound of organs at Chorton (in its general sense) over Cammerton. But the most important reason for making high-pitched organs was the expense: a lower pitch required extra pipes at the bottom of each stop, and being the longest pipes they used the most tin. The new organ built in Bach's Thomaskirche in Leipzig in 1773 was still at Chorton. By the beginning of the 19th century most organs were built in Kammerton (as it was then usually called), although in Saxony in the early 19th century an organ pitch of A+1 was still common.
Cammerton was associated with secular music; in the 18th century it was the usual pitch of instruments other than the organ and brass. Eventually many organs adopted Cammerton, which was more convenient when playing with other instruments. As noted above, nine 18th-century German organs at Cammerton survive, all at A–1 (which we can assume represented its normal frequency). There were other, lower species of Cammerton: the family of tief-Cammertons, including Opera-Ton and französischer Thon. These levels were all approximately a minor 3rd below A+1 and are thus difficult to keep distinct. The existence of ton de la chambre in France at A–1½ was probably the root cause of the confusion, since this frequency fell between the levels at A–1 and A–2 that were transposable on most German organ keyboards. The Cammerton levels at A–2 and A–1½, being common French pitches, probably came in when the first French woodwinds arrived in the 1680s. But A–1 must also have been current by the 1690s, as a stop in the Jacobikirche organ, Hamburg (Schnitger, 1693), was at a' = 408, a minor 3rd below the rest of the organ at a' = 489.
Praetorius documented the use of a pitch a minor 3rd below his CammerThon (at A+1) that was used, he said, ‘a great deal in different Catholic chapels in Germany’. So the level at A–2 was not a complete innovation in Germany with the arrival of French instruments. Indications for tief-Cammerton in wind parts disappear after the mid-1720s, though German woodwinds were still made at A–2 until at least 1770.
The parts and occasionally the scores to German music of the early 18th century (such as works for organ and other instruments) that involved the simultaneous use of two and sometimes three different pitch standards were normally notated in different keys. In transposing, composers were obliged to consider a number of interrelated practical factors: the technical effects on different kinds of performers, changes of sonority, key and its relation to affect, and temperament. The effect of transposition on voices was a primary consideration. The tone qualities of the different vocal registers were consciously distinguished until the Classical period, and breaks from chest to head voice, which generally occur at specific frequencies, were avoided. Register placement is obviously shifted by transposition. Transposition could also turn a high tenor part into one for falsettist (countertenor) by changing its range.
Although string instruments were also sensitive to changes of pitch and key, some or all the individual strings were regularly retuned as much as a whole step up and down in the 18th century; examples are found in works by Biber, Kuhnau, Bach and Mozart. Many string instruments then in use had been made in an earlier period when standard instrumental pitch was A+1; they were often tuned up to Cornet-ton in the early 18th century.
When parts were not in the appropriate key, organists were expected to transpose at sight. Woodwinds were less flexible. Their fingering system limited them to keys with no more than four sharps or flats, and each tonality had an associated character, technique and intonation. Some woodwinds like the traverso and hautbois d'amour were specialists in sharp keys, while others like the recorder and bassoon tended towards flats.
Temperament was a consideration for the fixed-pitch instruments such as keyboards and lute; melody instruments made ad hoc tuning adjustments as needed. Transpositions of a semitone were impractical in meantone, but when the intervals involved were the major 2nd and minor 3rd, and a so-called ‘regular’ meantone was used (i.e. one in which all the 5ths but one were tuned the same), intervals were virtually identical in standard tonalities.
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
Throughout his career, Bach worked with instruments at Cornet-ton (A+1) and various levels of Cammerton, although his method of notating their parts was different in each of the places he worked. The most complex situation was at Weimar. The organ in the court chapel where Bach was Konzertmeister was documented as in ‘Cornet Thon’. During the first year he wrote cantatas, Bach wrote parts for a single ‘Oboe’ notated a major 2nd above the other parts (organ, voices and strings). The strings must therefore have been tuned up to Cornet-ton, and the ‘Oboe’ must have sounded a tone below the organ (and therefore at the higher level of Cammerton, A-1). But the ‘Oboe’ disappeared at the end of 1714, to be replaced by an instrument Bach consistently called an ‘Hautbois’, whose parts now differed a minor 3rd from the organ and strings. From this time, Bach also notated certain other instruments at the interval of a minor 3rd, like the ‘Basson’ and ‘Flaut’ (recorder). Since the organ stayed at A+1, these instruments must have been at tief-Cammerton, or A–2. All the remaining works written for the Weimar chapel show this relationship.
The parts to Bach's music written at Cöthen, on the other hand, are in a single key; presumably all the instruments were at the same pitch. But there is reason to think the prevailing pitch at Cöthen was a form of tief-Cammerton, either A–1½ or A–2. The voice ranges of cantatas written there are unusually high, and when he used material from Cöthen later at Leipzig, Bach sometimes performed it at ‘tief-Cammerthon’. The problematic trumpet part to the second Brandenburg concerto would be significantly easier on an instrument at tief-Cammerton instead of A–1.
At Leipzig, the performing materials for most of Bach's vocal works indicate that the strings, voices and woodwinds were at Cammerton and the organ and brass were a major 2nd higher. Bach's predecessor, Johann Kuhnau, had specified in 1717 that the pitch of the organs at the Thomas- and Nicolaikirchen was Cornet-ton. But Kuhnau had used figural instruments at intervals of both a 2nd and a minor 3rd below Cornet-ton, ‘depending’, he said, ‘on which is most convenient’ (i.e. which pitch would yield mutually satisfying keys). He had woodwinds available, in other words, at both normal Cammerton and at tief-Cammerton. Since tonalities with open strings were preferable on the string instruments, and appropriate tonalities were critical for the unkeyed woodwinds, the presence of woodwinds tuned a semitone apart was extremely practical: it offered Kuhnau a choice of more combinations of keys in which to compose.
During
Bach's first year and a half at Leipzig, he took advantage of this option by
writing several cantatas at tief-Cammerton: nos.22, 23, 63 and 194, and
also the first version of the Magnificat. (Cantatas nos.22 and 23 were
his trial pieces and were performed together; Cantata no.63 had been conceived
some years earlier, probably for performance at tief-Cammerton, and in
Leipzig was performed on the same day as the Magnificat – which, with
Cantata no.194, had antecedents in Cöthen.) The last known date that Bach used
the tief-Cammerton option with his regular winds was 4 June 1724. He
revised the Magnificat for a performance in the 1730s, transposing it
from E to D, probably
because tief-Cammerton woodwinds were no longer available. Questions of
notation and transposition caused by pitch differences affect the following
works by Bach: bwv12, 18, 21, 22, 23, 31, 63, 70a,
71, 80a, 106, 131, 132, 147a, 150, 152, 155, 161, 162, 172, 182,
185, 186a, 194, 199, 208 and 243a. Most but not all these
questions are addressed by the Neue Bach-Ausgabe (for a detailed
discussion, see Haynes, A1995).
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
The description Praetorius gave of pitch relations in Prague (see §I, 2(iii), above) applied to Vienna as well. There, ChorThon (at A–1) was the pitch of church music and was a tone lower than CammerThon/Cornettenthon (at A+1). 70 years later Muffat, writing in 1698 for the Habsburg emperors, used the same concepts to describe French pitch:
The pitch to which the French usually tune their instruments is a whole tone lower than our German one (called Cornet-Ton), and in operas, even one and a half tones lower. They find the German pitch too high, too screechy, and too forced. If it were up to me to choose a pitch, and there were no other considerations, I would choose the former [of the French pitches], called in Germany old Chorton, using somewhat thicker strings. This pitch lacks nothing in liveliness along with its sweetness.
Writing
in Prague in 1701, T.B. Janowka still used Praetorius's terminology; he called
the higher pitch Zinck-thon and associated the lower one, Chor-Thon,
with the new French and Italian wind instruments (which he considered to be ‘ex
B’, i.e. in B). The
older Praetorius-style pitch names persisted well into the 18th century in the
Habsburg lands, though by mid-century the terminology began to reverse itself
as it had done 50 years earlier in northern Germany. The nomenclature, though
not the musical practice, was in direct opposition to the usage in northern
Germany at the same time.
The Habsburg court was strongly influenced by northern Italy, and many of its important musicians were Italian. Since instrumental pitch in Venice was normally A+0, it is not surprising to observe Cammerton move up a semitone already in Fux's time. By the period 1740–70, if not before, woodwinds being made in Vienna were at a' ≈ 430–435. In the same period, there are steady reports of organs being tuned down a semitone to A+0, and a number of new ones were also built at this level. In both cases, the influence of Venice was probably responsible (see §I, 2(i), above).
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
Various kinds of evidence suggest that at the beginning of the 17th century the primary English church standard was known as ‘Quire-pitch’, and that its level was a' ≈ 473, i.e. between A+1 and A+2. Instruments like recorders, cornetts and sackbuts were generally pitched a semitone lower than Quire-pitch (Q–1, a' ≈ 448; cf. Praetorius: ‘The English pitch, however, is a very little lower [than CammerThon at a' ≈ 464], as the instruments made in that country show, for instance cornetts and shawms’). Viol consorts, at Consort-pitch, were another whole-step lower at Q-3, or a' ≈ 400.
Very few church organs escaped destruction during the Civil War and subsequent Commonwealth (1642–60). At the Restoration the instruments and pitches from before 1642 were temporarily re-established and a number of new organs were built. The newer French woodwinds that came into fashion in the 1670s and their pitch of A–1½ (Ton de la chambre; it was conveniently compatible with Consort-pitch at Q–3) eventually became important enough that organs had to be rebuilt or replaced at lower pitches in order to play with other instruments. English organs whose pitches have survived are thus almost always at Quire-pitch, a semitone, or a whole tone below it (a' ≈ 473, a' ≈ 448 or a' ≈ 423). The lowest of these levels, a' ≈ 423 or Q–2, became the dominant organ pitch in England in the 18th century and into the 19th, identified at least once as ‘Chappell-pitch’; when it was later adopted by orchestral instruments in about the 1730s, it was called ‘new Consort-pitch’. The other two higher levels vanished during the course of the 18th century. Handel often played an organ built in 1708 by Bernard Smith at the chapel of St James's Palace; this instrument was at a' = 466 (A+1).
Old consort pitch at Q–3 or a' ≈ 400 is represented by woodwinds made by Peter Bressan, Joseph Bradbury, Thomas Cahusac and Thomas Stanesby jr, and by at least one chamber organ attributed to Smith. That it probably extended backwards to the early 17th century is indicated by Praetorius (‘Formerly in England … most instruments were made to sound a minor 3rd lower than our present-day CammerThon’) and suggested by the fact that chamber and house music actually flourished during the Interregnum (its pitch therefore remaining unchanged). It is also likely that this was the pitch used by Blow and Purcell when they wrote for wind instruments. It is known that the pitch of the opera orchestra at the Queen's Theatre where Handel produced his first operas was a quarter-tone higher than Ton d'Opéra in France; this would put it at Q–3/A–1½. By the early 1720s, Handel was probably using A–1, which was standard opera pitch on the Continent. His later oratorios were probably performed at ‘new Consort-pitch’, or Q–2 (a' ≈ 423); the famous tuning fork left by Handel in 1751 at the Foundling Hospital is at a' = 422½.
Not all instruments fit into the Quire-pitch grid. The consorts of foreign musicians maintained by Henry VIII played as separate units, for instance, and had no need to conform to organ pitch standards. The organ and cornetts at Christ Church, Oxford, were at A+2 and A+0 respectively. While the quire pitch system was generally valid for all instruments until the first quarter of the 18th century, it began losing importance with the influx of Italians like Giuseppe Sammartini and their instruments at A–1 and A+0. In the period 1730–70 both new Consort-pitch at Q–2 (a' ≈ 423) and A+0 (a' ≈ 435) began to appear in woodwinds. By 1770 there were almost no woodwinds at the older Consort-pitch (Q–3); Q–2 was still present but most woodwinds were at A+0 (which was by then common in Venice, Paris, Vienna and much of Germany). Only organs retained the last vestige of the Quire-pitch grid, the majority being tuned to Q–2.
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
By the last part of the 18th century church organs throughout Europe tended to be in different pitches than orchestral instruments. Organs were generally pitched as they had been a century before, which, in relation to other instruments, made them too high in Germany and too low in France and England.
The two principal orchestral pitches were A–1 and A+0, and in the course of the Classical period the latter (more accurately a' = 430–440) become predominant, although the process of change was gradual and not universal. A+0 was already the predominant instrumental pitch in Venice at the beginning of the 18th century, in Vienna and Prague about 1740, in London and Rome by about 1770, in France about 1780 (officially in the 1790s) and in northern Germany at the beginning of the 19th century.
The Classical period was characterized by minor pitch differences of about a comma (a ninth of a whole-tone or about 21 cents) that could be accommodated on woodwinds by using alternate joints or tuning slides. Each theatre in Vienna and Paris, for instance, had its own slightly different pitch until the 1820s. Multiple joints were usually numbered from lowest to highest, and today often only one joint with a higher number remains; this is an indication that pitch was generally on the rise, since the lower-pitched joints were probably laid aside and eventually separated from the instruments.
In northern Italy at the end of the 18th century wind players were evidently getting their instruments from abroad; many woodwinds by Augustin and Heinrich Grenser are found now in Italian collections. Grensers are normally at about a' = 433, a pitch observed in Venice throughout the century. Although the corista di S Pietro at A–2 was maintained on organs at the Vatican until late in the 19th century, at the end of the 18th there were reports of woodwinds in Rome at about the same level as Venice. By this time, A+0 had come to be called coristo Lombardo and was considered normal in most parts of Italy, including Naples.
In France Ton d'Opéra, which had been at A–2 in mid-century (since the traditional repertory, including Lully's works, was still on the boards), began fluctuating between A–2 and A–1½ in the 1770s as a result of reforms and changing repertory. Harpsichords and woodwinds in France varied between A–1 and A+0, the latter predominating by the 1780s. They were sometimes classified according to their pitches as ‘modern’ (i.e. at A+0) or ‘ancien’ (A–1). The Concert Spirituel regularly featured soloists from abroad and had a reputation for a high pitch, probably A+0 (a' ≈ 435). At the end of the century this pitch, called Ton d'orchestre, was officially adopted in Paris by the new Conservatoire. Many of the best woodwinds were shortened at this period, in the hope that they could be retained. The rationalist mentality of the age did not eliminate small variations in pitch standard, as the multiple joints of instruments made at the time testify. Even the Opéra was eventually forced to adopt Ton d'orchestre, though the poor showing of the singers of the time who attempted the earlier repertory was blamed on the raised pitch level. Charles Delezenne (1854) reported pitches at various theatres in Paris in 1823 as a' = 424, 428, 432 and, in 1834, 440.
The Italian influence on pitch throughout Europe was reinforced by the dynamism of the so-called ‘Wiener Klassik’. By the second third of the century performances in Vienna were generally at a' ≈ 430–435. Pitch remained at this level in Viennese instrumental, dramatic and much church music until the end of the century. Prague and other cities in the Habsburg empire were probably at the same pitch, since the court and many musicians circulated frequently. The latter part of the century saw much coming and going of wind players between Vienna and other places, suggesting a general agreement on pitch: famous soloists would not have switched instruments or set-ups merely for the sake of fluctuating pitch standards.
Reports in the 1770s compared Berlin's low pitch with the high one in Vienna. In some parts of northern Germany A–1 remained the standard until at least 1832. In Dresden, the famous Cammerton organs by Silbermann were probably responsible. It may also be that when A+0 became the general European standard, A–1 survived in many places because it had become a church pitch. Not only had organs been made to it in the mid-18th century, but being a whole tone below A+1, it remained more practical than A+0 for transpositions with older organs. Dresden was also a principal woodwind-making centre, and surviving instruments from there are at both A–1 and A+0 (the latter apparently for export). Berlin may have remained low as a result of the lingering influence of Frederick the Great's court (being a flautist, Frederick favoured a low pitch). A general pitch reference in Saxony at this time was the organ at the Nicolaikirche Leipzig, at A–1 (although flutes were made there at both A–1 and A+0).
Pitch, §I, 2: History of European pitch standards since the late 16th century
Since the early 19th century orchestral instruments have evolved through small adaptations rather than revolutionary new designs. As a result, fluctuations in pitch standards have been relatively minor. The mean pitch in Europe in 1858, when the diapason normal (a' = 435) was promulgated in France, was about a' = 446, just as it is today. The universal standard a' = 440 established in 1939 was no less artificial and unrealistic.
Historically, as we have seen, pitch has fluctuated both up and down. Present-day pitch is noticeably lower than Victorian England's ‘sharp pitch’ of a' = 452. Pitch at La Scala was at that same level in 1867, up from a' = 450 in 1856. In Vienna a generation after Mozart's death pitch seems to have been somewhat lower, at a' = 440–445. Thus almost from the beginning singers have been obliged to perform the music of Mozart and Verdi at a level several Hertz higher than the composers intended. At present pitch appears once again to be on the rise from a theoretical (and rarely used in orchestras) a' = 440 to as high as a' = 450. From a broader perspective these vacillations can be seen as temporary departures from a remarkably stable norm.
Pitch, §I: Western pitch standards
A General. B Italy. C France. D Germany. E Johann Sebastian Bach. F The Habsburg lands. G England. H Classical. I Since c1830.
PraetoriusSM, ii
PraetoriusTI
Waterhouse-LangwillI
J.J. Quantz: Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversiere zu spielen (Berlin, 1752/R, 3/1789/R; Eng. trans., 1966, 2/1985, as On Playing the Flute)
J.F. Agricola: Anleitung zur Singkunst (Berlin, 1757/R) [trans., with addns, of P.F. Tosi: Opinioni de' cantori antichi e moderni, Bologna, 1723/R]; Eng. trans., ed. J.C. Baird (Cambridge, 1995)
A. de la Fage: De l'unité tonique et de la fixation d'un diapason universel (Paris, 1859)
A.J. Ellis: ‘On the History of Musical Pitch’, Journal of the Society of Arts, xxviii (1880), 293–336; appx, 400–03; postscript, ibid., xxix (1881), 109–13; repr. in A.J. Ellis and A. Mendel: Studies in the History of Musical Pitch (Amsterdam, 1969/R), 11–62
A.J. Ellis: ‘The History of Musical Pitch in Europe’, On the Sensations of Tone (London, 2/1885/R) [Eng. trans. of H. von Helmholtz: Die Lehre von den Tonempfindung, Brunswick, 1863, 4/1877], appx XX, H–N
A. Mendel: ‘Pitch in the 16th and Early 17th Centuries’, MQ, xxxiv (1948), 28–45, 199–221, 336–57, 575–93
A. Mendel: ‘On the Pitches in Use in Bach's Time’, MQ, xli (1955), 332–54, 466–80
A. Mendel: ‘Pitch in Western Music since 1500: a Re-Examination’, AcM, l (1978), 1–93; pubd separately (Kassel, 1979)
C. Karp: ‘Pitch’, Performance Practice: Music after 1600, ed. H.M. Brown and S. Sadie (London, 1989), 147–68
H.W. Myers: ‘Pitch and Transposition’, A Practical Guide to Historical Performance: the Renaissance, ed. J.T. Kite-Powell (New York, 1989), 157–163
G. Stradner: ‘Stimmtonhöhe: Tonarten- und Klangcharacter’, Die Klangwelt Mozarts, Kunsthistorisches Museum, 28 April – 27 Oct 1991 (Vienna, 1991), 109–20 [exhibition catalogue]
R. Weber: ‘Was Sagen die Holzblasinstrumente zu Mozarts Kammerton?’, Tibia, xviii (1992), 291–8
P.T. Young: 4900 Historical Woodwind Instruments: an Inventory of 200 Makers in International Collections (London, 1993)
B. Haynes: Pitch Standards in the Baroque and Classical Periods (diss., U. of Montreal, 1995)
H.W. Myers: ‘Pitch and Transposition’, A Performer's Guide to Seventeenth-Century Music, ed. S. Carter (New York, 1997), 325–40
D. Wraight: The Stringing of Italian Keyboard Instruments c.1500–c.1650 (diss., Queen's U. of Belfast, 1997)
G.B. Doni: Annotazioni sopra il Compendio de' generi e de' modi della musica (Rome, 1640); extracts ed. C. Gallico as ‘Discorso sesto sopra il recitare in scena con l'accompagnemento d'instrumenti musicali’, RIM, iii (1968), 286–302
A. Barcotto: Regola e breve raccordo (MS, 1652, I-Bl); Eng. trans. in Organ Yearbook, xvi (1985), 47–70
P.F. Tosi: Opinioni de' cantori antichi e moderni (Bologna, 1723/R; Eng. trans, ed. J.E. Galliard, 1742, 2/1743/R as Observations on the Florid Song)
G. Paolucci: Arte pratica di contrappunto (Venice, 1765–72)
C. Gervasoni: La scuola della musica (Piacenza, 1800)
G. Cesari and G. Pannain: La musica in Cremona nella secondo metà del secolo XVI: e i primordi dell'arte monteverdiana (Milan, 1939), pp.xv–xxii
R. Lunelli: Der Orgelbau in Italien in seinen Meisterwerken vom 14. Jahrhundert bis zur Gegenwart (Mainz, 1956)
L.F. Tagliavini: ‘Considerazioni sulle vicende storiche del “corista”’, L'organo, xii (1974), 119–32
P. Barbieri: ‘Il corista bolognese, secondo il rilevamento di V.F. Stancari’, L'organo, xviii (1980), 15–29
A. Parrott: ‘Transposition in Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610, an “Aberration” Defended’, EMc, xii (1984), 490–516
P. Barbieri: Acustica, accordatura e temperamento nell'illuminismo veneto (Rome, 1987)
P. Barbieri: ‘Chiavette and Modal Transposition in Italian Practice (c.1500–1837)’, Recercare, iii (1991), 5–79
K. Kreitner: ‘Renaissance Pitch’, Companion to Medieval and Renaissance Music, ed. T. Knighton and D. Fallows (London, and New York, 1992), 275–83
P. van Heyghen: ‘The Recorder in Italian Music, 1600–1670’, The Recorder in the 17th Century: Utrecht 1993, 3–64
J.G. Kurtzman: ‘Tones, Modes, Clefs and Pitch in Roman Cyclic Magnificats of the 16th Century’, EMc, xxii (1994), 641–64
D. Lasocki and R. Prior: The Bassanos: Venetian Musicians and Instrument Makers in England, 1531–1665 (Aldershot, 1995)
La BordeE
MersenneHU
E. Loulié: Eléments ou principes de musique (Paris, 1696, 2/1698; Eng. trans., 1965)
G. Muffat: Florilegium secundum (Passau, 1698; ed. in DTÖ, iv, Jg.2/ii, 1895/R)
Traité de la musique moderne, avec quelques remarques sur la musique ancienne (MS, 1702, GB-Lbl, c.12r-v)
S. de Brossard: Dictionaire de musique (Paris, 1703/R, 3/c1708/R); Eng. trans., ed. A. Gruber (Henryville, PA, 1982)
J.M. Hotteterre: Méthode pour la musette (Paris, 1737/R)
J.-J. Rousseau: Dictionnaire de musique (Paris, 1768/R; Eng. trans., 1771, 2/1779/R)
F.-J. Fétis: ‘Sur le diapason’, Revue musicale, i/2 (1828)
C. Delezenne: ‘Sur le ton des orchestres et des orgues’, Mémoires de la Société Impériale des Sciences de l’Agriculture et des Arts de Lille, 2nd ser., i (1854), 1–23
C. Pierre: Les facteurs d'instruments de musique (Paris, 1893/R)
P.-J. Hardouin: ‘Les flottements du diapason’, Musique de tous les temps, no.23 (1963)
M. Benoit: Versailles et les musiciens du roi, 1661–1733 (Paris, 1971)
R. Rasch, ed.: J. Sauveur: Collected Writings on Musical Acoustics (Utrecht, 1984)
FürstenauG, i
J. Mattheson: Das neu-eröffnete Orchestre (Hamburg, 1713/R)
J. Mattheson: Das forschende Orchestre (Hamburg, 1721/R)
J. Kuhnau: Letter to Johann Mattheson, 8 Dec 1717, J. Mattheson: Critica musica, i (1722), 229–39
G.P. Telemann: Preface to Harmonische Gottes-Dienst, i (Hamburg, 1725–6)
J.D. Heinichen: Der General-Bass in der Composition, oder Neue und gründliche Anweisung (Dresden, 1728/R)
J. Adlung: Anleitung zu der musikalischen Gelahrtheit (Erfurt, 1758/R, 2/1783)
J. Adlung: Musica mechanica organoedi, ed. J.L. Albrecht (Berlin, 1768/R); ed. C. Mahrenholz (Kassel, 1931)
A.A. Hülphers: Historisk afhandling om musik och instrumenter (Västerås, 1773/R)
J. van Heurn: De orgelmaaker (Dordrecht, 1804–5/R)
F. Bösken: Quellen und Forschungen zur Orgelgeschichte des Mittelrheins (Mainz, 1967–88)
A. Hohn: ‘Die Orgeln Johann Andreas Silbermanns’, Acta organologica, iv (1970), 11–58
E. Nickel: Der Holzblasinstrumentenbau in der Freien Reichsstadt Nürnberg (Munich, 1971)
W.R. Thomas and J.J.K. Rhodes: ‘Schlick, Praetorius and the History of Organ-Pitch’, Organ Yearbook, ii (1971), 58–76
U. Dähnert: Historische Orgeln in Sachsen: ein Orgelinventar (Frankfurt, 1980)
W. Müller: Gottfried Silbermann: Persönlichkeit und Werk (Frankfurt, 1982)
A. Smith: ‘Belege zur Frage der Stimmtonhöhe bei Michael Praetorius’, Alte Musik: Praxis und Reflexion, ed. P. Reidemeister and V. Gutmann (Winterthur, 1983), 340–45
H.W. Myers: ‘Praetorius's Pitch’, EMc, xii (1984), 369–71
E. Segerman: ‘Praetorius's pitch?’, EMc, xiii (1985), 261–3
M. Spielmann: ‘Der Zink im Instrumentarium des süddeutsch-österreichischen Raumes 1650 bis 1750’, Johann Joseph Fux und die barocke Bläsertradition: Graz 1985, 121–55
E. Segerman: ‘Eighteenth-Century German and French Pitches’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.42 (1986), 62–8
H. Vogel: ‘North German Organ Building of the Late Seventeenth Century: Registration and Tuning,’, J.S. Bach as Organist: his Instruments, Music, and Performance Practice, ed. G. Stauffer and E. May (Bloomington, IN, 1986), 31–40
G. Stradner: ‘The Evolution of the Pitch of Cornetts and Trombones at the Time of Scheidt and Buxtehude’, Dietrich Buxtehude and Samuel Scheidt: Saskatoon, SK, 1987, 106–16
F.-H. Gress: Die Klanggestalt der Orgeln Gottfried Silbermanns (Frankfurt, 1989)
E. Segerman: ‘The Sizes and Pitches of Praetorius's Sackbuts’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.73 (1993), 50–51
M. Schaefer, ed.: J.A. Silbermann: Das Silbermann-Archiv: der handschriftliche Nachlass des Orgelmachers Johann Andreas Silbermann (1712–1783) (Winterthur, 1994)
H.W. Myers: ‘Praetorius's Pitch: some Revelations of the Theatrum Instrumentorum’, Perspectives in Early Brass Scholarship: Amherst, MA, 1995, 29–45
H.W. Myers: ‘Praetorius's Pitch Standard’, GSJ, li (1998), 247–67
J. Koster: ‘Praetorius's “Pfeifflin zur Chormass”’, Stimmton und Transposition (Bremen, forthcoming)
A. Werner: Städtische und fürstliche Musikpflege in Weissenfels bis zum Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts (Leipzig, 1911/R)
A. Schering: Musikgeschichte Leipzigs, ii: Von 1650 bis 1723 (Leipzig, 1926/R)
A. Dürr: Studien über die frühen Kantaten J.S. Bachs (Leipzig, 1951, 2/1977)
A. Dürr: Kritischer Bericht, Johann Sebastian Bach: Neue Ausgabe Sämtlicher Werke, II/iii (Kassel, 1955)
L.D. Dreyfus: Basso Continuo Practice in the Vocal Works of J.S. Bach: a Study of the Original Performance Parts (diss., Columbia U., 1980)
U. Prinz: ‘Zur Bezeichnung “Bassono” und “Fagotto” bei J.S. Bach’, BJb 1981, 107–22
P. Brainard: Kritischer Bericht, Johann Sebastian Bach: Neue Ausgabe Sämtlicher Werke, I/xvi (Kassel, 1984)
A. Dürr: ‘Neue Erkenntnisse zur Kantate BWV 31’, BJb 1985, 155–9
B. Haynes: ‘Johann Sebastian Bach's Pitch Standards: the Woodwind Perspective’, JAMIS, xi (1985), 55–114
H. Heyde: ‘Blasinstrumente und Bläser der Dresdner Hofkapelle in der Zeit des Fux-Schülers Johann Dismas Zelenka (1710–1745)’, Johann Joseph Fux und die barocke Bläsertradition: Graz 1985, 39–65
H. Heyde: ‘Der Instrumentenbau in Leipzig zur Zeit Johann Sebastian Bachs’, 300 Jahre Johann Sebastian Bach, Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, 14 Sept – 27 Oct 1985 (Tutzing, 1985), 73–88 [exhibition catalogue]
W. Schrammek: ‘Orgel, Positiv, Clavicymbel und Glocken der Schlosskirche zu Weimar 1658 bis 1774’, Johann Sebastian Bach: Leipzig 1985, 99–111
A. Dürr: Kritischer Bericht, Johann Sebastian Bach: Neue Ausgabe Sämtlicher Werke, I/ix (Kassel, 1986)
W. Cowdery: The Early Vocal Works of Johann Sebastian Bach: Studies in Style, Scoring, and Chronology (diss., Cornell U., 1989)
M. Marissen: ‘Organological Questions and their Significance in J.S. Bach's Fourth Brandenburg Concerto’, JAMIS, xvii (1991), 5–52
R. Dahlqvist: ‘Pitches of German, French, and English Trumpets in the 17th and 18th Centuries’, HBSJ, v (1993), 29–41
K. Hofmann: ‘Neue Überlegungen zu Bachs Weimarer Kantaten-Kalender’, BJb 1993, 9–29
T.B. Janowka: Clavis ad thesaurum magnae artis musicae (Prague, 1701/R)
P.M. Vogt: Conclave thesauri magnae artis musicae (Prague, 1719)
A. Kellner: Musikgeschichte des Stiftes Kremsmünster (Kassel, 1956)
A. Mandorfer: ‘Musikerziehung in Kremsmünster’, Studien und Mitteilungen zur Geschichte des Benediktinerordens und seiner Zweige, lxxxviii (1977) 9–52
G. Stradner: ‘Zur Stimmtonhöhe der Blasinstrumente zur Zeit Joseph Haydns’, Joseph Haydn: Vienna 1982, 81–6
E. Selfridge-Field: ‘The Viennese Court Orchestra in the Time of Caldara’, Antonio Caldara: Essays on his Life and Times, ed. B.W. Pritchard, (Aldershot, 1987), 115–52
K. Hubmann: ‘Vom rechten Ton am Fagott: zur Frage von Stimmton-Verhültnissen im Barock’, ‘Musik muss Man machen’: eine Festgabe für Josef Mertin, ed. M. Nagy (Vienna, 1994), 377–84
Hopkins-RimbaultO
R. North: The Musicall Grammarian being a Scientific Essay upon the Practise of Musick (MS, 1728, GB-H R.11.xliii); repr. in J. Wilson, ed.: Roger North on Music (London, 1959); ed. M. Chan and J.C. Kassler (Cambridge, 1990)
R. North: Theory of sounds Shewing, the Genesis, Propagation, Effects and Augmentation and Applications of them (MS, 1728, GB-LB1 Add.3253); repr. in J. Wilson, ed.: Roger North on Music (London, 1961)
W. Tans'ur: A New Musical Grammar, or The Harmonical Spectator (London, 1746, 5/1772 as The Elements of Musick Display'd, 7/1829 as A Musical Grammar)
A. Baines and others: ‘James Talbot's Manscript’, GSJ, i (1948), 9–26; iii (1950), 27–45; v (1952), 44 only; xiv (1961), 52–68; xv (1962), 60–69; xvi (1963), 63–72; xxi (1968), 40–51
J.B. Clark: Transposition in Seventeenth Century English Organ Accompaniments and the Transposing Organ (Detroit, 1974)
I. Harwood: ‘A Case of Double Standards? Instrumental Pitch in England c.1600’, EMc, ix (1981), 470–81 [see also xi (1983), 76–7]
H.W. Myers: ‘Instrumental Pitch in England, c1600’, EMc, (1982), 519–22
D. Lasocki: Professional Recorder Players in England, 1540–1740 (diss., U. of Iowa, 1983)
P.E. Daub: Music at the Court of George II (c.1727–1760) (diss., Cornell U., 1985)
D. Gwynn: ‘Organ Pitch in Seventeenth Century England’, JBIOS, ix (1985), 65–78
E. Segerman: ‘English Viol Sizes and Pitches’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.38 (1985), 55–62
E. Segerman: ‘English Pitch Standards, mostly c.1600’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.65 (1991), 13–16
E. Segerman: ‘Early 18th-Century English Pitches, Especially “Consort Flute Pitch” and “Church Pitch of F”’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.67 (1992), 54–6
P. Holman: Four and Twenty Fiddlers: the Violin at the English Court, 1540–1690 (Oxford, 1993)
E. Segerman: ‘On Early 17th Century English Vocal and Organ Pitches’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.76 (1994), 86–8
M. Goetze: ‘Transposing Organs and Pitch in England’, FoMRHI Quarterly, no.78 (1995), 61–7
J.H. Lambert: ‘Observations sur les flûtes’, Nouveaux mémoires de l'Académie royale des sciences et belles-lettres de Berlin, vi (Berlin, 1775), 13–48
J.F. Reichardt: Ueber die Pflichten des Ripien-Violinisten (Berlin and Leipzig, 1776)
J.J.H. R[ibock]: Bemerkungen über die Flöte, und Versuch einer kurzen Anleitung zur bessern Einrichtung und Behandlung derselben (Stendal, 1782/R)
D.G. Türk: Von den wichtigsten Pflichten eines Organisten (Halle, 1787/R, rev. 2/1838 by F. Naue)
H.C. Koch: Musikalisches Lexikon (Frankfurt, 1802/R)
C.F. Michaelis: ‘Auffoderung zur Festsetzung und gemeinschaftlichen Annahme eines gleichen Grundtones der Stimmung der Orchester’, AMZ, xvi (1814), 772–6
R.G. Kiesewetter: ‘Über den Umfang der Singstimmen in den Werken der alten Meister, in Absicht auf deren Aufführung in unserer Zeit: gelegentlich auch Etwas über die mit dem Stimmtone auf den Orgeln und in den Orchestern nach und nach vorgegangenen Veränderungen’, AMZ, (1820), 154ff, 193ff, 201ff, 321ff, 329ff, 337ff, 345ff, 353ff, 361ff
P. Lichtenthal: Dizionario e bibliografia della musica (Milan, 1826/R)
[F. Kandler]: ‘Wiens musikalische Kunst-Schätze, in Briefen eines Reisenden’, AMZ, xxix (1827), 817–24
A. Schindler: ‘Die gegenwärtige hohe Orchesterstimmung und ihr Ausgang’, Niederrheinische Musik-Zeitung, iii/8–9 (1855)
C. Näke: Über Orchesterstimmung (Dresden, 1862)
H. Heyde: ‘Die Werkstatt von Augustin Grenser d. Ä. und Heinrich Grenser in Dresden’, Tibia, iv (1993), 593–602
Grove5 (L.S. Lloyd)
E. Leipp and M. Castellengo: ‘Du diapason et de sa relativité’, ReM, no.294 (1977) [whole issue]
B. Holland: ‘Singers Join in a Lament about Rising Pitch’, New York Times (Jan 1989)
The earliest information of interest regarding musical pitch is the discovery of 65 clapperless two-tone bells unearthed among 7000 items of funerary goods from the tomb of Marquis Yi, of the Zeng state (d c433 bce) at Zuizhou in China (see Zhong, §2). Bell chimes were apparently restricted to the highest ranks of nobility and could apparently be used to play pentatonic music in a variety of keys. Though bronze bells, stone chimes and ocarinas have been found dating from as early as the second millennium bce, the importance of the Zeng bells lies in the inscriptions on many of them, for they document the names of standard pitches (lü) belonging to each of the different states throughout the domain, that is the pitch to which instruments in offical ensembles would be tuned (see China, §II, 4). Subsequently standard pitch in China came to acquire a symbolic and cosmological importance and to be related to other official standards of measurement for length, capacity and weight as manifested in the length and diameter of official pitch pipes. Other traditions may, like the Chinese, have inspired a considerable body of theory concerned with intervals, tunings and temperaments but seem to have shown less concern for absolute pitch standards.
Attention
to pitch standards is not confined to literate societies and a standard is
likely to be required for any ensemble which includes one or more instruments
which are difficult to retune. Clearly ideal vocal ranges will have an impact
on the choice of pitch for fixed pitch instruments in ensembles that incorporate
the voice. This is still the case, for example, in the performance of Indian
classical music where the system tonic pitch sa will be selected by the
singer to suit his or her own preferred vocal range and other instrumentalists
involved in the performance will tune their instruments up or down accordingly
or select the most appropriate instrument from a range (flute players, for
instance, will carry with them a number of differently pitched flutes). The
introduction of factory-made harmoniums has had less effect on South Asian
pitch standards than might have been expected, though all harmoniums are
assumed to be of the same pitch. Harmonium players also learn to perform in
different ‘keys’ when accompanying the voice so as to suit the preferred choice
of pitch for sa. This is often centred on or around C for male singers
and A or A for female
singers. A common way of referring to pitch levels is by specifying the
corresponding black or white key on a harmonium. Thus in North India a tablā
(whose pitch range is limited to a minor 3rd) may be described as kāli
pānc (‘black five’, i.e. the fifth black key from the left hand side
of the harmonium) which means it is suitable for use at or near the pitch level
of D
.
Apart from harmoniums made for the Indian market, since the mid-19th century other Western instruments and ensembles (accordions, pianos and wind bands, for example) have found a place in the musical practice of other nations and peoples and, as a result, Western pitch standards have come to be adopted. In Japan, where issues of pitch as well as interval structures dominated the work of early scholars, even traditional ensembles have accommodated to a Western pitch norm during the 20th century. The most traditional of instruments, the shakuhachi flute, which was formerly of a standard pitch resulting from a standard length of 54·5 cm, is now made in 12 different sizes equivalent to the pitch of the 12 Western semitones so that any one flute can be chosen to suite the ‘key’ of a modern ensemble, obviating the need to shade tones which could conflict with the desired tonal effect. Modern European pitch pipes were introduced in Japan around 1920.
In the Arab world European pitch standards are also used. In Cairo, for example, classical musicians in the present day use a' = 440 as a standard, though a respected Egyptian musician writing at the beginning of the 20th century indicated that the standard was a' = 435 (al-Khula‘ī in his 1904 Kitāb al mūsīqi al-sharqi). Classical ensembles in Cairo today recognize two tunings, the lower of which gives b' as 440 and which involves violinists and ‘ud players in tuning down a whole step while nāy (flute) players select a larger flute. However, as they get older, singers often prefer ensembles to tune down, sometimes as much as a minor 3rd.
Towards the end of the 19th century European comparative musicologists became keenly interested in the pitch systems of non-Western peoples, believing that research in this area would help them with their theories on the origins and development of music. Stumpf and his younger colleague Hornbostel wrestled with related concepts such as Tondistanz (interval, see Abraham and Hornbostel, 1926), Helligkeit (brightness) and Tonigkeit (tone quality or chroma). Stumpf made use of tuning measurements supplied by Alexander Ellis who published mathematical descriptions of various non-Western scales such as the roughly equidistant five-tone Javanese sléndro and the Thai equidistant seven-tone scale. For this Ellis had invented the cents system which divided the equal-tempered semitone interval into 100 cents for purposes of accurate comparison of interval size. His essay ‘On the Musical Scales of Various Nations’ has long been considered a landmark in the development of comparative musicology because it was first to show that a great variety of pitch systems have evolved throughout the world including equal-tempered five- and seven-note scales. The usefulness of his detailed measurements, however, which were derived from work with museum instruments, including gongs and xylophones of doubtful quality and condition, has since been questioned (Schneider, 1990).
Benjamin Ives Gilman pioneered similar work in the USA, making recordings during expeditions among Zuñi and Hopi Indians to understand their pitch systems; he also recorded a Javanese gamelan and other musical traditions that were featured in the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.
The early researchers depended on subjective pitch matching of instrumental and vocal tones with sounds produced from devices such as tuning forks and monochords and faced different problems from those confronting later researchers who used electronic equipment such as the strobocom (Jones) and the melograph (Seeger and Hood). Electronic instruments work by isolating and measuring the lowest pitch (or fundamental) of any musical sound and the problem here is that psychologists have shown that fundamental frequency cannot be assumed to equate with perceived pitch. Schneider has pointed out that this especially applies to measurements taken from ‘inharmonic’ instruments such as gongs and xylophones rich in partials that do not bear a simple frequency relationship to the supposed fundamental. He further augues that a complex of tones (timbre) influences the experience of pitch and this seriously complicates the investigation of pitch systems, especially those where the indigenous musicians and theorists (if any) have not articulated their knowledge of the system other than through performance or tuning of instruments.
So-called equidistant or near equidistant scales have presented special problems to researchers since scales of fixed pitch instruments frequently did not achieve theoretically equidistant standards when measured and researchers were left with the problem of deciding if deviations from the norm were musically significant to the musicians and what degree of tolerance in tuning one should allow for. There is some evidence for suggesting that there is a greater degree of tolerance of pitch deviation in the case of musical systems employing large scale steps (such as an anhemitonic equipentatonic scale with steps of 240 cents) than in those traditions using semitones. For instance a Ganda harp or xylophone (Uganda) might be assumed to be tuned to a theoretically equidistant pentatonic scale, yet when measured incorporates steps as small as 200 cents or as large as 280. The problem then remains to discover if these larger and smaller intervals are an essential part of the scalic system or if they are to be disregarded because they are not conceived as different from other intervals which come closer to the equidistant norm (Cooke). Ellis was perhaps the first to face such a problem when a Thai xylophone, whose pitches he had measured, did not turn out to be equidistant. He simply constructed an equidistant seven-note scale on his bichord and asked Thai musicians to compare this scale with the scale derived from the xylophone. The musicians unanimously declared the first (exactly equidistant) scale to be good and the scale derived from the xylophone to be out of tune. He was able to conclude that ‘The ideal Siamese scale is, consequently, an equal division of an Octave into seven parts, so that there are no Semitones and no Tones, when the instrument is properly tuned’ (p.1105).
Even supposedly well-tuned musical instruments do not necessarily provide all the information one needs about a pitch system, for like the scale of the pianoforte, the tunings may be a compromise and the ‘ideal’ pitches are more likely to be found from variable pitch instruments or from the singing voice. Futhermore, instruments may provide more pitches than are actually utilized in performance: for instance the khene (mouth organ) of Laos is tuned to a diatonic scale but is used to produce basic pentatonic systems.
One cannot assume that pitch systems do not change through time. Berliner, for example (1978, pp.60–61), observed that mbira players of Zimbabwe changed the tunings of their instruments and cited the example of the musician Mude who over a period of several years used five different tunings with his group and how he liked to sing with different chunings ‘for a change’. Berliner added, ‘While I would have liked to have been able to posit a theory of Shona mbira tuning … the complexity of the matter makes it premature at this time’. With the increasing globalization of musical culture the Western pitch system is impacting on many non-Western systems. Keeler (GEWM, p.390) reported that when the piano was first introduced to Myanmar (Burma) in the 19th century, the white keys were retuned to a Burmese scale for accompanying singers and other instrumentalists, but that this practice has since been abandoned. There are many other examples of the increasing acceptance of Western scales: much has been written about the problems of the pélog and sléndro scales of Indonesian gamelans over the past century, yet it has also been noted that ‘the Indonesian National Anthem, all patriotic school songs and virtually all popular music use the Western Diatonic Scale’ (Perlman and Krumhansl, 100). A similar situation exists in many other cultures.
At the end of the 20th century acoustical measurement of vocal and instrumental scales and melodies has been aided by the use of computer programs which can sample frequency over a period of several seconds or more which allows the averaging of frequencies to ascertain the most significant in determining the pitch areas of a musical system. Such work is being supplemented with intra-cultural and cross-cultural tests of musical cognition and perception in the effort to better comprehend the pitch systems. Awareness of issues such as categorical perception of pitch classes and tuning tolerance are being built into experiments and careful observations of tuning processes seek to understand better the ideal scale or most ‘comfortable’ temperament that an instrument tuner may be aiming at. Nevertheless, the exploration of non-Western musical pitch systems continues to pose challenging problems.
For more information on individual pitch systems refer to individual country articles.
GEWM, iv (‘Burma’, W. Keeler; ‘Thailand’, T. Miller)
A.J. Ellis: ‘On the Musical Scales of Various Nations’, Journal of the Royal Society of Arts, xxxiii (1885), 485–527; appx, 1102–11
B.I. Gilman: ‘Hopi Songs’, Journal of American Archaeology and Ethnology, v (1908) [whole issue]
O. Abraham and E.M. von Hornbostel: ‘Zur Psychologie der Tondistanz’, Zeitschrift für Psychologie und Psychologie der Sinnersorgane, no.98 (1926), 233–49
K.P. Wachsmann: ‘Pen-equidistance and Accurate Pitch, a Problem from the Source of the Nile’, Festschrift für Walter Wiora, ed. L. Finscher and C.-H. Mahling (Kassel, 1967), 583–92
E.M. Burns and W.D. Ward: ‘Categorical Perception of Musical Intervals’, JASA, lv (1974), 456; lviii (1975), 132; lxiii (1978), 456–8
P.A. Berliner: The Soul of Mbira: Music and Traditions of the Shona People of Zimbabwe (Berkeley, 1978, 2/1993)
R. Vetter: ‘A Retrospect on a Century of Gamelan Tone Measurements’, EthM, xxxiii (1989), 217–28
P.R. Cooke: ‘Report on Pitch Perception Experiments carried out in Buganda and Busoga (Uganda)’, AfM, vii/2 (1992), 119–25
A. Schneider: ‘“Okutuusa Amadinda” Zür Frage aquidistanter Tonsysteme und Stummungen in Afrika’, Musikkulturgeschichte: Festschrift für Constantin Floros, ed. P. Petersen (Wiesbaden, 1990), 493–526
K. Vaughan: ‘Pitch Measurement’, Ethnomusicology, an Introduction, ed. H. Myers (London, 1992), 462–8
M. Perlman and C. Krumhansl: ‘An Experimental Study of Internal Interval Standards in Javanese and Western Musicians’, Music Perception, xiv (1996), 96–116