Tuning temperament strongly affects mood and expression

[faulty_damper]

Here's a demonstration of some of the different tunings before the 20th century.

After listening to him perform many pieces, particularly J.S. Bach and Chopin, I've come to greatly appreciate these works even more and how much more important it is to perform these works in the temperament for which it was conceived and composed.  The examples of the Well-Tempered Clavier were very effective in showing the mood that these tunings provided.  Suddenly, playing them in equal temperament doesn't even come close to expressing these moods.

Listen to the funeral march's minor thirds in mean temperament.  That's just beautiful and so much more expressive than I've ever heard before.  I don't think I can play this piece on equal temperament again after hearing that.

In modern perspective, I think this would greatly benefit the pianist to know what kind of effects on mood and expression these tunings have upon the listener.  It's like listening to these pieces afresh even though I've heard them countless times.  It makes me appreciate that they didn't compose in a key at random, but did so for musical expressive purposes.

[hfmadopter]

That was interesting. I've messed with temperament on my digital and even my wife agrees that day in and day out on many types of music we like Meantone. Some pieces do agree with Equal but really that's kind of Sanitized sounding once you get used to Mean.. Meantone has more color to the tonality, though the bass is a bit less powerful. My Kawai digital offers several temperaments, they call Mean, Meantone.

 Another we like for classical is Kirnberg which offers a bit different color but similar to Mean really ( a bit cleaner sounding but not like Equal, it's nice, so is Werkmeis ). These are good for period music that actually my grand piano was built in. There is no Well temperament in my Kawai Digital.

[faulty_damper]

When I was very, very young, I heard a snippet of a piano concerto on TV, possibly for a commercial or on PBS.  I could hear that the piano was out of tune with the orchestra and I didn't like the genre of the piano concerto from then on.  Even now, my sensitivity to the beats in equal temperament bother me as it lacks a lot of consonances and harmony that makes a lot of music pleasurable.  This is one of the reasons why I want a digital piano because I want to be able to select the temperament that best expresses the music.

It's really strange that since listening to the pieces in the video, I've suddenly lost interest in playing Bach and Chopin knowing that what I'm playing doesn't sound right.  For some reason, I'm compelled to play music that best utilizes equal, such Yiruma's compositions or maybe even pop since the expressiveness is in the melodic lines, not the tuning.

[hfmadopter]

 Even now, my sensitivity to the beats in equal temperament bother me as it lacks a lot of consonances and harmony that makes a lot of music pleasurable.  This is one of the reasons why I want a digital piano because I want to be able to select the temperament that best expresses the music.

It's really strange that since listening to the pieces in the video, I've suddenly lost interest in playing Bach and Chopin knowing that what I'm playing doesn't sound right.  For some reason, I'm compelled to play music that best utilizes equal, such Yiruma's compositions or maybe even pop since the expressiveness is in the melodic lines, not the tuning.

I'm working on a popular piece ( well it's probably not so popular these days, " A Groovy Kind Of Love" is the name) which transitions from G to A and  I have added some octave work to that. It sounds nice in equal.  On the digital I do it in Concert Grand Mellow 1 with a slight tonal curve added and for the reprieve I add in string background. Anyway if I change temperament in the piece I was pleased to find that the strings follow the change. I actually have not settled on a temperament for that piece yet. Today might be that day.

I'm doing a medley of Jesu Bambino and Bring The Torch Jeanette Isabelle on Christmas Eve with the digital piano this year and that sounds really nice in Werkmeis Temperament. Actually most pieces do. Werkmeis is a step away from Equal, once used, where Equal sounded bright before it now sounds flat by comparison. And it isn't that Werkmeis is brighter but the harmony is more interesting. That medley has a New Age touch to it, a lot of two note harmony in the chorus line. I've added fill notes in the bass, a run up the keyboard from the deep bass to an octave change in between Jeanette back to Jesu but no key change in that one. The harmony is more pleasing to here in Wermeis.

Schumann's  Schlummerlied and Bach's Christmas Orotorio BWV 248 both sound great in Kirnberg temperament ( I'm playing that on Christmas Eve as well). Kirnberg sounds in between Mean and Werkmeis. Mean being the most extreme of the three in terms of away from the sound of Equal.

On another note : I don't know a lot about the CA 95 that you are interested in . The MP6 though, being a stage piano comes with tweaking options  from EQ to tone to both touch and tone curves. It's too dynamic at level 10 of the dynamics setting, to be more like my grand piano it needs to be less dynamic, I set it around level 7 on touch dynamics and that brings it more in line ( at level ten you could miss notes with too light of a touch on the key it's that responsive, at level 7 no matter how light you press, as long as you hit the key bed you will get some sound from the note). This beyond the standard touch settings for light to heavy ( which is a velocity curve). However being a stage piano you must set all this stuff up , it's endlessly adjustable and a very dull and digital sounding piano as it comes out of the box. With stage pianos the manufacturers must assume you will be messing with this stuff. I would assume that household console models would come from the factory more playable out of the box but then I don't know if they have the endless tweaking options in all cases ( I know some do).. I have not read up on nor played the CA95. Make sure it has what you want though ( the owners manual is available in PDF at Kawai US) !