Tuning & Temperament
Just Intonation, Beating and Why Intervals Sound in Tune
Pure intervals come from small whole-number ratios, and beating is what stops them sounding pure. What just intonation gives, and what it cannot fix.
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Glossary
Articles
Tuning & Temperament
Equal Temperament: What It Costs and What It Buys
Twelve equal semitones solve the problem pure intervals create. The cost is small in fifths, large in thirds, and paid by every fixed-pitch instrument.
Tuning & Temperament
Meantone and Well Temperament: Why Keys Used to Sound Different
Quarter-comma meantone, the wolf fifth and the well temperaments in between: what keyboard tuning did to each key before equal temperament settled the argument.
Tuning & Temperament
Pythagorean Tuning: How Stacked Pure Fifths Build a Scale
Pythagorean tuning builds every interval from pure 3:2 fifths. Here is the seven-note scale it produces, its whole tones and semitones in cents, and the wolf fifth it leaves behind.
Tuning & Temperament
What Are Cents? The Unit That Measures Small Pitch Differences
A cent is one hundredth of an equal-tempered semitone. Here is the formula, what the common intervals measure in cents, and what a tuner is showing you.
Orchestration
Voicing a String Quartet: Registers, Doublings, Weight
The quartet is four registers, not four violins. What each instrument can sustain, where the texture muddies, and which double stops lie under the hand.