JUST 1NTONA TION. 49 



ON JUST INTONATION. 



Dr. STONE : Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen In an interna- 

 tional exhibition of scientific instruments, the object of conferences 

 must necessarily be to draw the attention of persons present to those 

 particular points in that collection which deserve our study, and to this 

 I propose in the section which has been kindly committed to me, to 

 confine myself. We have in the acoustical department of the present 

 exhibition, an exceedingly fine collection of instruments brought to- 

 gether, illustrating the debatable point of just or tempered intonation. 

 Indeed I may say that we have, with one exception, a perfect collection 

 of such contrivances. In entering upon just intonation, I am aware 

 however, that incedo perignes and that I am liable to touch upon a little 

 warm controversial matter, which I shall endeavour to my utmost to 

 exclude. If we take for instance the written words of the father of 

 just intonation, Perronet Thomson, whose original instrument stands 

 in the corridor, we find him simply saying this "The temptation to 

 the old systematic teaching to play out of tune was, that performers 

 might play with perfect freedom in all keys by playing in none. Hence 

 the rivalry in magnitude of organs, and the sleight of hand and foot 

 to conceal. But a reaction is setting in, and the world is finding out 

 that music is not a noise, but the concord of sweet sounds." This 

 was written in 1830 the original edition. Yet in 1876 we find Dr. 

 Stainer, an equally able acoustician and musician saying, as regards 

 equal temperament " When musical mathematicians shall have 

 agreed among themselves on the exact number of divisions necessary 

 in the octave, and when mathematicians shall have constructed in- 

 struments upon which the new scale can be played ; when the practical 

 musician shall have framed a new notation which shall point out to the 

 performer the ratio of the note he is to sound to the generator, when 

 genius shall have used all this new material to the glory of art ; then " 

 and here comes the bathos " then it will be time enough to found a 

 new theory of harmony on a mathematical basis." I must confess, 

 that this putting off to the Greek Kalends, of scientific improve- 

 ment for practical purposes, does not seem to me, although I 

 generally agree with much that Dr. Stainer says scientific, or indeed 



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