Kawai CN33 User Manual download pdf (Page 52)

Page

FUNCTION

BUTTONS

9) TEMPERAMENT

The CN33 digital piano offers immediate access to a variety of musical temperaments popular during the Renaissance

and Baroque periods. It may prove interesting and educational to experiment with different temperaments, other

than the modern ‘equal temperament’ standard this is dominant in music today.

BRIEF EXPLANATION OF TEMPERAMENTS

EQUAL TEMPERAMENT

(PIANO ONLY)

This is the default temperament. If a piano sound is selected the tuning is

stretched like an acoustic piano (EQUAL TEMPERAMENT). If any other type of

sound is selected the tuning will be EQUAL (FLAT). An explanation of EQUAL

TEMPERAMENT and EQUAL TEMPERAMENT (FLAT) is provided later in this

section.

If a piano sound is used in a layer with any other sound, then both sounds will

use the EQUAL TEMPERAMENT (stretched) tuning.

MERSENNE PURE TEMPERAMENT

(MAJOR)

MERSENNE PURE TEMPERAMENT

(MINOR)

This temperament, which eliminates dissonances for thirds and ﬁfths, is still

popular for choral music because of its perfect harmony.

Performers must be aware which key they are playing in when using this

temperament.

Any key modulation will result in dissonances. When playing music in a particular

key, the key of the temperament must also be correctly matched.

When playing in a major key select Pure (Major) and when playing in a minor

key select Pure (minor).

PYTHAGOREAN TEMPERAMENT This temperament, which uses mathematical ratios to eliminate dissonance

for ﬁfths, is very limited for use with chords, but it produces very characteristic

melodic lines.

MEANTONE TEMPERAMENT This temperament, which uses a mean between a major and minor whole tone to

eliminate dissonance for thirds, was devised to eliminate the lack of consonances

experienced with certain ﬁfths for the Mersenne pure temperament. It produces

chords that are more beautiful than those with the equal temperament.

WERCKMEISTER III TEMPERAMENT

KIRNBERGER III TEMPERAMENT

These two temperaments are placed in between Meantone and Pythagorean.

For music with few accidentals, this temperament produces the beautiful chords

of the mean tone, but as accidentals increase, the temperament produces the

characteristic melodies of the Pythagorean temperament. It is used primarily for

classical music written in the Baroque era to revive the original characteristics.

EQUAL TEMPERAMENT (FLAT) This is an ‘unstretched’ equal temperament that divides the scale into twelve equal

semitones. This produces the same chordal intervals in all twelve keys, and has

the advantage of limitless modulation of the key. However the tonality of each

key becomes less characteristic and no chord is in pure consonance.

EQUAL TEMPERAMENT This is the most popular piano temperament. The hearing ability of a human is

uneven and is not as accurate with high frequency and low frequency as it is

with the middle range. This temperament’s tuning is stretched to compensate

for this so the sound will be heard naturally to the ears. This ‘stretched’ equal

temperament is a practical variation of the ‘unstretched’ equal temperament

which was invented on a mathematical basis.

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Step 1

Press and hold the TRANSPOSE and USB buttons, then press the STRINGS button.

The display will alternate between showing ‘tMP’ (Temperament) and a symbol to indicate which type of temperament

is in use.

Hold down both buttons

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Kawai CN33 User Manual Page 52

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