Lehman Bach temperament

While musing on the matter of a good temperament to set for BWV 988, of which I am currently making an engraving for publication based on the first edition by Schmid, etc, I was pondering Lehman for the job. By serendipitous chance I came across this article which happens to be written by one of our members @fss .

It’s worthy of attention I reckon.

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I don’t dare to jump in a discussion on temperaments as I don’t know enough, but I wish to remind you that another harpsichordist/researcher, Dominic Eckersley, has deducted a temperament from the doodle on the title page of WTC, just like Brad Lehman. The Eckersley temperament is different, from what I understand: https://dominiceckersley.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/rosetta_revisited.pdf

I had forgotten this but I have been reminded by going on the Dominic Eckersley website to re-check his “wire project”.

I am going to read the paper Andrew has posted.

Dear Andrew and Domenico. Indeed the my.ptg.org article by tuning-specialist Sturm is certainly worth reading.

Let me clarify that I have carefully scrutinised Lehman’s proposals, as well as the rebuttals published by every single temperament scholar I know about (and I believe I know them all, some personally). I have abridged my conclusions in my recently-updated Unequal Temperaments book. This is all I can say here: I have now entered a “truce” with Lehman and will avoid entering any further public discussions about his work.

Just a clarification for readers of Sturm’s paper. Peter Williams observed that there were a handful of extant copies of the WTC title page, written by Bach’s students. Interestingly, only one of them reproduced, and only partially, the “squiggle” from which Lehman and quite a few others have deduced their diverse proposals. Williams implies that, had Bach wished the squiggle to convey any meaning (not necessarily about temperament), he surely would have advised his students to copy it.

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My newest article about this (2021-22) was published in November. It is the first piece in the current issue of the “Bach” journal (Riemenschneider). Pick up a free copy of it here: Bradley Lehman's Home Page

There is a lot of theory and history in there. Among other things, it shows why critics of the 2005 paper missed the point of the argument, and it shows why Vallotti has some rough spots in the Goldberg Variations.

Enjoy!
Bradley Lehman

Le 12/01/2023 03:12, Bradley Lehman via The Jackrail écrit :

[bpl] bpl https://jackrail.space/u/bpl Bradley Lehan
January 12

My newest article about this (2021-22) was published in November. It
is the first piece in the current issue of the “Bach” journal
(Riemenschneider). Pick up a free copy of it here: Bradley Lehman’s
Home Page http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/essays.html

There is a lot of theory and history in there. Among other things, it
shows why critics of the 2005 paper missed the point of the argument,
and it shows why Vallotti has some rough spots in the Goldberg Variations.

Thanks for the link to your recent article and the mention of the GV,
since this was the OP’s question. Could you tell us here what the thirds
are like in your own temperament (how many cents wider than pure), since
that’s the main point the discussion has been focussing on?

Thanks.