mean-tone

“When singing a mean-tone third, the harmony totally locks in, like a shoe that fits perfectly.”

Major thirds

“In the performance of early music, we are introduced to the concept of mean-tone thirds, which sit a bit lower than equal-tempered thirds.”

Major thirds

“The mean-tone third is more consonant with its buddies, the root and the fifth, but introduces a fair amount of coma in the tuning system.”

Major thirds

“On the other hand the last work, Bach's well known Toccata and Fugue in D minor (T-15) is powerfully different from what we normally hear - think here of E. Power Biggs - and also very dramatic in nature due to the organist expressive manipulation of this organ's mean-tone temperament which can produce powerful dissonances.”

Audiophile Audition Headlines

“Their treatment of this organ's mean-tone temperament produces in their hands both tension and variation in the music because cadences always sound different in one of the dominant keys.”

Audiophile Audition Headlines

“chapel's organ - installed in 2007 and modeled after a 17th-century German instrument with mean-tone temperament, a tuning common to the period - "perfectly suits this music.”

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