NATURE 
tonometer, for which his pitch was really A=439'5. It 
is as well to go back to the protocols of the Congress 
at Vienna in 1885, which led to the adoption of the 
French pitch in Austro-Hungary. After a unanimous 
acceptance of the diapason normal at 15° C. it was pro- 
posed that, in order to keep the wind instruments in 
performance to the initial standard vibration number 
A= 435, the brass and wood wind instruments, and also 
the organ, should be made for 24° C. (75:2 F.) !—thus in- 
troducing a second standard to be used concurrently 
with the first, the necessity attributable to the vibration 
number being increased automatically by the heating 
and rarefaction of the air increasing its velocity, and 
with the orchestral wind instruments by the breath and 
handling of the players. Mr. Blaikley has shown the 
velocity of air in pipes is always less than in free air, 
possibly through the friction of the walls, but in the 
organ flue pipes it comes so near to free air that the 
organ may be almost regarded as a_ thermometer. 
So high a temperature as 24°C. was not left unchal- 
lenged ; a wiser determination was urged of 20°, which 
in practice would have proved right. However the 
great differences likely to arise in average temperatures 
due to climatic conditions, and to warming and lighting 
apparatus, as, for instance, gas or electricity, prevented 
a decision from being arrived at ; so that Vienna is now, 
-as London was pending the decision of the Philhar- 
monic Society, using a convenient empiric pitch of about 
A=440 for concert performances. Ingenious as the 
Viennese plan in 1885 would have been, it is wiser to 
have one standard with one note, A, for its expression, 
and one mean temperature. For brass instrument 
makers a B flat fork may be used, and to suit the old 
custom of organ-builders and pianoforte-makers, a C 
fork ; but in preparing them equal temperament should 
be rigidly observed. 
In 1879, at the instance of Mdme. Adelina Patti, the 
Covent Garden Opera adopted French pitch ; a recent 
trial in performance satisfied me that it was at A = 440, 
the temperature being about 70° F., and that there had 
been no departure from the intention of using the French 
standard. Little notice has at any time been taken of 
this important change at the Opera; but when the 
Queen’s Hall was opened in 1893, Mr. Newman, the 
manager, and Mr. H. J. Wood, the conductor, lost no 
time in introducing the diapason normal for all perform- 
ances for which they were responsible ; the proprietors 
going to the expense of having the organ, which had just 
been built at the high pitch, lowered. Mr. Henschel, in 
his symphony concerts at St. James’s Hall, and in found- 
ing the Scottish orchestra, speedily followed. But the 
decisive point for this country was reached when, in July 
1896, the Philharmonic Society, the most eminent musical 
institution in this country, elected to adopt the French 
diapason normal, and in the following November de- 
cided to have a standard tuning-fork for their concerts. 
Having consulted me, the directors accepted my sugges- 
tion for that pitch that it should be A=439 at 68° F. 
Forks made for the Society by Valantine and Carr, of 
Sheffield, were verified by me with the aid of the 
Scheibler tonometer in the Science Department, South 
Kensington, and besides the one retained by the Society, 
accurate copies were presented by the directors to the 
Science and Art Department, the Society of Arts, the 
Royal Academy of Music, the Royal College of Music, 
the Guildhall School, Trinity College, London, and my- 
self; the last being accessible on all lawful days at 
Messrs. John Broadwood and Sons, 33 Great Pulteney 
Street, W. The B flat is stated in the same minute of 
the Society as=465, the C=522; this last happens to 
be a just minor third above A=435, an accidental, 
although useful, coincidence. 
The vibration number 439 is really the French standard 
raised to an average performing temperature, theoretically 
NO. 1557, VOL. 60] 
[AucusT 31, 1899 
by my coefficient of a thousandth part of a complete 
vibration a second for one degree Fahrenheit, so that for 
435 the rise for the next degree is 435. In a variety of 
ways I have sought an average concert teniperature 
which I have finally taken at 68°, at which strings, wind, 
organ and piano should be in tune. According to my 
coefficient A=435 at 59° should be A=438'93 at 68°. 
The round number 439 is more convenient. Briefly ex- 
pressed, my coefficient is *5 per degree for C=soo; 
nearly, if not quite, the rise in free air. According to 
Helmholtz, the velocity of sound in dry air is at o° C. 
32° F.) 322 metres = 1089°3 feet, say 1090 ; according to 
Dr. Ellis, at 60° F. the velocity is 1200 feet per second ; 
with this my coefficient practically agrees. In further 
justification, I quote the Covent Garden A=44o; the 
same vibration number for pianos, communicated to me 
by Herr Seuffert (Bosendorfer’s), Vienna ; the clarinet of 
Herr Miihlfeld, of Meiningen and Bayreuth, A=439'5, it 
being understood when warm; a complete trial of all 
the wind instruments of Mr. Henschel’s orchestra with a 
piano tuned to A=439 in a room exactly at 68° F. ; and 
lastly, the crowning triumph of the Lamoureux orchestra 
from Paris joining forces with the Queen’s Hall orchestra 
in London this year, the accuracy of pitch in the perform- 
ance being unassailable, A = 439! I should like to add 
for organs my trials of the St. James’s Hall organ, at 
52° C= 531 and at 72° C= 541, as one of many com- 
parisons of this nature; and conclude with Prof. 
Blaserna’s report of a trial at Vienna, 1885, when 
A = 435 at 15° C., warmed to 30° C., became A = 457°7, 
equivalent to raising A toa tempered B flat. If a piano 
were supplied for a concert intended to be French pitch, 
at the standard fork A = 435, in London or Paris, 
Berlin or Vienna, it would be too flat for performance. 
It would be a concession of great importance, which the 
musical world could not be too grateful for, if the Paris 
diapason normal were revised for the higher temper- 
ature, 20 C., and legalised A.D. 1900, for France at 
A = 439. Our Philharmonic Society has shown the way, 
the rest of the world would soon follow. Neither the 
stability of pitch of the tuning-fork nor that of a piano- 
forte during a concert need be considered. Dr. Ellis 
gives the flatténing of tuning-fork as 1 in 16,000 per 
degree Fahrenheit ; Mr. Blaikley and myself in one trial} 
only of a concert pianoforte, ‘o25 per degree ; but for the 
short time a concert lasts this must be imperceptible, 
the elasticity of the music wire having to be reckoned 
with against the least change of tension. 
The objections to the A = 439 that have been urged 
are that wind instrument makers may take it as a start- 
ing point for a lower temperature than 68°, but not if they 
are conscientious? We can legislate for this no more 
than we can for the tendency to exceed the present high 
pitch, as is shown by our military bands and the majority 
of the brass bands in this country, in spite of Kneller 
Hall, which is bound to maintain the old Philkarmonic 
pitch until the War Office releases the army from it and 
provides or sanctions French pitch bands. Organ- 
builders who can work with accurate forks and a ther- 
mometer will have no difficulty with the French pitch— 
indeed, nearly all are in favour of it, as are the pianoforte- 
makers and dealers generally, but there are some who 
seem to fear their instruments will suffer in brilliancy of 
effect by the reduction. When, however, we consider 
the rise in the tension of pianos during the last thirty 
years, due to improvement in music wire and to a great 
change of construction, causing in grand pianos a rise in 
tension equivalent to a minor third in pitch, or more ; 
and when we reflect that the difference of pitch proposed 
in tuning to the new Philharmonic is only 3/5 of an equal 
semitone, we may see in the change more a gain thana 
loss by a possible increased fulness of tone-quaiity, and 
above all we shall have uniformity with the rest of the 
musical world. A. J. HIPKINS. 
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