Herewith, with John's gracious permission, is his own story about his search
for a temperament.

Cheers,

Bud Clark
San Diego CA USA
 
-------Original Message------- 
 
From: John Brombaugh 
Date: 6/1/2008 10:16:29 PM 
To: Bud 
Subject: Temperament on John Brombaugh's Op. 9, formerly at Ashland Avenue
Baptist Church, Toledo, Ohio 
 
Hi Bud, 
 
Out of the clear blue nowhere, someone informed me that you wrote a nice
article for the PIPORG-L mentioning my Op. 9 instrument that's presently in
Rochester, NY -  and was relocated just last month in the so-called "German
Church" in that city, as the R.C. cathedral needed to prepare for the new
Fritts organ which is right now en route from Paul's shop in Tacoma on its
way for installation in Rochester. (The Fritts shop had an open house for it
last Sunday.) 
 
The temperament on my Op. 9 has been in use from its beginning in 1972 and
has not been altered. It is very close to Andreas Werckmeister's best known 
Well Temperament", the first described in his earliest book mentioning
temperaments that was published in 1681, and then included somewhat modified
in his 2nd publication of his more well-known treatise "Orgel Probe" in 1695
 That temperament is generally called Werckmeister III and might be
considered the foundation of all "Well Temperaments" of the period when
Meantone tuning began being replaced in the German organs. 
 
So far, though I have been studying temperaments for more that 40 years, I
have found no information that says for sure exactly where and when
Werckmeister's ideas really went into use. For example, Kerala Snyder ca.
1982 wrote that this happened ca. 1683 to Buxtehude's instrument at the
Lübeck Marienkirche, but in a revision to her book about 2 years ago
retracts that idea. From Snyder's assertion, I wrote a few years later that
Johann Sebastian's knowledge of Buxtehude's work from his visit in 1706 may
have bent him toward using well temperaments the rest of his life - again,
that is only an assertion, not provable. I tend to think the central Germans
(where, for example, Werckmeister and Bach lived) drifted toward
non-Meantone tuning before the old highly liturgical churches in the great
Hanseatic northern cities did. 
 
Ibo Ortgies' recent doctoral thesis (Univ of Göteborg, Sweden) more or less
states that nearly pure Meantone was the ONLY temperament common in that
region till beyond 1720 when everything started to change so transposition
and performance into all keys would be possible. While Ortgies may be
correct, in fact, his thesis has been highly questioned by no one other than
Harald Vogel - a real lover of Meantone if there ever was one! 
 
Once the barriers that restrained tuning started to fall, many varieties can
into use, e.g., several from JSB's student, Johann Phillip Kirnberger,
Marpurg, Neidhardt, and many others. I think this brought a certain amount
of confusion to the point that Georg Andreas Sorge, court and town organist
at Lobenstein, finally very strongly advocated going to Equal Temperament in
his "Der in der Rechen- und Messkunst wohlerfahrne Orgelbaumeister,"
Lobenstein 1773. Brad Lehman tells more about this at his site: 

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~bpl/larips/tunits.html 
 
My first acquaintance with a "well temperament" tuned organs was upon
hearing the first (1965) recording of the Pieter Backer (1671) organ at the
Bonafatiuskerk in Medemblik, Nederlands, the Flentrop shop had just restored
under guidance of Cor Edskes. Edskes went off on a new binge to use
Werckmeister's IIIrd temperament (it was so new to everyone then, it falsely
went under the name W II!), and I was so astonished upon hearing the musical
effect that I urged my first customer, David Boe, to try in on the organ we
built for First Lutheran Church in Lorain, Ohio. David (who later was Dean
at Oberlin Conservatory for 15 years) and still teaches on a reduced basis)
liked the Medemblik organ which he heard during a sabbatical with Gustav
Leonhard in 1968, so he said "try it." We both liked the result, so it ended
up - to my knowledge, becoming the absolute first use in a new organ so
large (28 stops) anywhere in our modern world. David became advisor for my
Toledo project, so we went on further and, as a result, I've never tuned ANY
of my instruments after Lorain in Equal Temperament except the small
Continuo Positives that have transposition capability by moving the keyboard
action up or down a halftone - which absolute will not allow anything but ET
 (My Op. 2 at Trinity Luth in Ithaca, NY, which David dedicated in 1966 was
tuned in ET; I left it that way because that's the way it was made, but I
really hate the sound ... ) 
 
From my musical fascination and scientific/mathematical orientation, I have
done much more research to find the ultimate keyboard temperament, so Op. 9
was tuned in the slightest variation away from W III, but it is so close
that no one can really tell the difference from Werckmeister's description.
In the meantime, however, I've drifted toward Herbert Anton Kellner's "Bach"
temperament he described in "Early Music" ca. 1978, an idea I was very close
to when finishing my Op. 16 for Grace Episcopal Church in Ellensburg, WA, in
1974. 

My constant search for better and better came to an end when I realized that
what is ideal depends on what you intend to do with a particular keyboard
instrument. Every temperament has its good side and its bad side; that makes
ET to me to be "equally bad!" For my large concert hall organs, we've used
Kellner and have been completely supported with its musicality by virtually
everyone who has played them, including the orchestras. 

I would dare say the real area where Kellner would not be satisfactory would
be an instrument that is primarily intended to perform Franck's music most
of the time - as CF's music is primarily on the opposite side of the Circle
of Vths from almost everyone else's typical keys. 

Perhaps the other dangerous area is much of the Anglican music from Herbert
Howells - for example, his many compositions in Db! 
 
Well, Bud, I get excited when I think about musical temperaments, so perhaps
I've gone overboard here beyond what you want to read, so I'll conclude for
now. But thanks for your positive comments on the PIPORG-L page. 
 
 
Kind regards, 
 
John 
__________________________________________________________________________ 
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