Many of us have gravitated towards a system of "just" intonation,
rather than the tempered scale that's used for tuning pianos. You may
not have even thought about this and simply accepted that the piano is
the arbiter of what's in tune and what's not. However, equal temperament
is really a compromise tuning system (and all systems will
have their pros and cons). However, if one tunes according to the
natural harmonics present, one gets a very different tuning for
particular intervals (especially the major third) than with equal
temperament.
On a keyboard, of course, one has to choose a tuning system and
deal with its pros and cons, since once tuned, it's fixed (until you
tune again). There are examples of organs with split sharps that allow
for a different D# than Eb, for example, but that need not concern us
here (you're unlikely to have one available!).
However, with a choir (or instrumental group that can be flexible
with pitch) one can sing or play pure thirds, for example, no matter
what the root of the chord. This is, in essence "just" intonation. This
wikipedia article
can give you a start if this is new. Barbershoppers use just intonation
all the time and I'll have a guest post soon about that approach.
To show the differences in cents (remembering that there are 100 cents in a half step), here is a chart of chords in just intonation with the difference in cents between just and equal temperament.
As you can see, the major third is 14 cents lower in just
intonation than in equal temperament. And the dominant seventh chord
includes the same lower third, but 31 cents lower for the seventh (which is a chord used constantly in barbershop)!
There's much more I could say about science, but I think it's more
important to get to practical matters! How do I use this in my choirs?
How do I teach them to do this?
First, you have to train your own ears to hear the difference
between a tempered and pure major third. This will take some work if
it's totally new to you. I still remember an interview with David
Willcocks, after his choir participated in the Bach cantata series on
Telefunken with Gustav Leonhardt. He was asked if he accepted the lower
tuning of the thirds and responded that he felt it was surely correct,
but that his ear still heard and wanted a "brighter" third.
Most of us were trained at some point to sing the third "high"
because otherwise in a dominant chord (where the third is the leading
tone) the tonic chord that follows will be flat. I can say that doesn't
have to be the case, but can't deal with that yet--patience!
With my choirs I often do an exercise early in the year to help
them hear a pure third. This requires a group who can sing accurate
unisons/octaves and a room which is resonant enough to be responsive to
overtones. I have them sing a chord in A or Bb with voicing B2 root
(near the bottom of staff), B1 fifth above, T2 octave, T1 fifth above, A
root above that, and S the fifth above that (i.e. near the top of the
staff). They need to sing very pure and unified pitches with a clear,
ringing fifth. I usually use an "ah" vowel and it needs to be a very
bright, forward (and unified) "ah." And they need to sing senza
vibrato with a fairly loud dynamic (I ask them to breathe frequently
and keep the air flowing). In other words, they only sing root and
fifth, no third. If they can do all of this and the room is reasonably
responsive, you (and they) will start to hear the third appear in the
room as a harmonic. Sometimes it takes a while, or my singing the
harmonic lightly as an example after they've cut off, for them to hear
it. But normally it will start to become clear and in the right room can
be quite loud (you may have had the experience of a harmonic appearing
that no one is singing when your group sings particularly well in
tune).
If I can get them to hear this, then I can ask sopranos or tenors,
for example, to match the third they hear in the room. If they can do
this and learn to feel/hear the restful nature of this pure third
(because it is in "harmony" with the natural harmonic system, there are
no beats), I can then re-voice the chord in different ways with
different parts singing the third. It's very interesting then, if
they've really settled into this tuning, to play the same chord/voicing
on the piano, which now sounds very "jangly" (OK, that's a vague and
perhaps invented term, I know! but to my ear the beats in the thirds on
the piano strike me that way!) and out of tune. I wrote something about
this in my blog after the last NCCO conference in reference to how my ear has changed over time.
This is just an opening exercise, but then I have to work on tuning
chords in vocalises at the beginning of rehearsals, and as we begin to
work repertoire, to do the same, particularly on any chord that is held
for any length of time. Most often, if they aren't tuning the third
well, I remove the third from the chord (so that only parts with root
and fifth sing) and then sing the third for them myself. Then I have the
part which sings the third match my intonation. It takes time to do
this and skill builds gradually, but it's very possible. If barbershop
quartets and choirs can do this, there's no reason your choir cannot as
well. But it takes consistent effort.
This has already gone on a bit too long--and might be too esoteric
for some! I promise I'll get around to more basic issues of teaching
good intonation and fixing various intonation problems.
Until Memorial Day I'll be posting twice a week, Thursday and
Saturday, so I can cover more ground on a fascinating and important
topic before the summer hiatus. Next, a guest post about barbershoppers's
methods of teaching tuning, then next week, how I use (and don't use)
piano in rehearsals.
If you have the chance to try the exercise I give above with your choir, let me know the results!
2 comments:
I'm very interested and excited to try this, but this quarter I'm doing mostly works with piano this quarter. Do you suggest waiting to do this until I have more unaccompanied works on the program?
Ken,
I think you can start the process with your choir in warmups or on any pieces that are a cappella, even if you begin with tuning pure thirds on final chords.
It takes some time before your and your choir's ears get used to this, so it's reasonable to begin. By the time you do a primarily a cappella program, you'll be well along.
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