Papers by Dominic Eckersley
Instructed micro-tuning of a single note on the qin can be seen from the very earliest moments of... more Instructed micro-tuning of a single note on the qin can be seen from the very earliest moments of written musical composition, the first indication marking of the oldest known manuscript of qin music and, for that matter, the oldest substantial surviving playable manuscript known. 碣⽯調幽蘭 Jié Shí Diào Yōu Lán, 'Stone Tablet Mode Secluded Orchid', a composition, written down in the Tang Dynasty, and currently in Japan, lays before us a song probably from the mid to late Han Dynasty. The first two characters of the manuscript represent an instruction to micro-tune a pressedstring note to bring it-and each subsequent note at that hui (mother of pearl harmonic) marker-in tune with an open string until the request is neutralised, much as sharps and flats are neutralised in Western music. This paper demonstrates that the author of the 幽蘭 Yōu Lán manuscript tuned the qin using only open strings with string three as the primary tuning note, and not by using the method employing only harmonics. This paper demonstrates that tuning the fundamentals of strings (open strings), rather than harmonics, produces different-and more accurate-pitches of the open strings, in particular the overwound strings one and two, due to their being foreshortened, i.e. they are the same length as strings an octave higher but have a greater diameter to compensate. The harmonics at the 5th hui therefore are out of tune with the fundamental due to this inharmonicity. The tuning of open strings also allows for micro-tonal pitches to harmonics passages enabling partial-semitone step chromaticism as a result. This paper demonstrates that a repair was undergone to a torn portion of the beginning passage by a person who was indeed in possession of the torn segment of the scroll, and/or with very accurate knowledge of the performance of the piece. It resolves a long-standing question regarding a subsequently poorly corrected character in this section of the manuscript in addition to demonstrating that a kind of vibrato between unisons on open strings and/or with harmonics played on different strings, by way of the beating of their slightly out of tune partials, resulting from good pure fifth 'pythagorean' tuning, was a desired function of the music, while additional unwritten vibrato, so common in the modern playing styles, is not only no longer required but countermands the clearly directed and desired purity of accurate internal intonation of pressed or open string notes, and also negating the affect of desirably mis-tuned unisons, both with, and without, harmonics.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
5th Lisbon Conference on Chinese Music, 2022
Normally we might expect a musician player of the Chinese guqin, the instrument of the literati o... more Normally we might expect a musician player of the Chinese guqin, the instrument of the literati of historical times, to come to the instrument through a chain of people, teacher to student, over a number of generations, perhaps tracing their musical heritage back three or more generations into the past. We might normally also expect such a musician to be Chinese or, at least, East Asian or South East Asian and to speak or read Chinese. It is my goal to demonstrate how and why a Caucasian musician from the West might come to the guqin-and one strung in traditional silk rather than the more modern nylon wrapped steel, in addition to what aspects come to play to action a move from a 40 year career as a performing artist of Western Classical music to one as a performer and recording artist of the guqin; what elements of Western culture act upon the music of guqin and how the intense Western training in music plays a role in forming or allowing the musician to make this transition successfully; how a background in Historically Informed Performance of the late Lack Renaissance through to the early Classical periods of the Western musician bears upon guqin performance, whether in the approach to historicity, to intonation or mannerism. I seek to demonstrate that being a completely self-taught guqin performer with a background in Western Historically Informed Performance is indeed part of the explanation to the transition's success and to discuss and demonstrate the effect this affect has upon the outcome.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Recent work in the field of canid evolution has brought into question the matter of where, how an... more Recent work in the field of canid evolution has brought into question the matter of where, how and when the modern dog was domesticated. Now generally believed to be descended from the wolf, Canis lupus, some biologists point directly at the Asian wolf, Canis lupus pallipes and Canis lupus arabs. Until relatively recently the domesticated dog was thought to be the result of the cross breeding of various canids, including the wolf, the jackal, Canis aureus and perhaps the coyote, Canis latrans. The possibility of any jackal ancestry subsequently ruled out it was classified as Canis familiaris. Given that the dog and the wolf are able to interbreed and produce viable fertile offspring, something not previously thought possible in higher mammals across species, the domesticated dog is currently considered a subspecies of the wolf being placed in the genus lupus, along with the wolf, and is now classified as Canis lupus familiaris. However, the DNA studied of ancient American dogs appears to show greater similarities with the Eurasian dog than with the north American wolf. After the examining of mitochondrial DNA of some 654 dogs from around the world, biologists hold that a commonality can be demonstrated between regional groups of dogs, implying a common parent or group of parents. The mtDNA varies little from dog to dog regardless of its location or breed, much as is the case with humans. Early Native Americans are thought to have brought dogs with them from Asia as the Aboriginals of Australia likewise are believed to have imported the dingo, Canis dingo.
Despite some opinion that dogs were domesticated independently in the Old World and in the New, most consider domestication to have happened only once, possibly around 15,000 years ago in Asia. I propose that dogs were pre-domesticated either from wolves and/or wild dogs independently in different places and different times without human intervention and that subsequent hybridization of wolves and dogs in addition to cross breeding within a species both by, and without man, has occurred which completed the domestication process. I point further to the possible movement of man and animal between the Eurasian and American continents prior to, and during the exposure of the Bering land mass and after its submergence.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
"Did Bach indeed leave a record of how he tuned his keyboard instruments as Bradley Lehman's 2005... more "Did Bach indeed leave a record of how he tuned his keyboard instruments as Bradley Lehman's 2005 article, 'Bach's extraordinary temperament: our Rosetta Stone' would have us believe? With a bit of cloak and dagger work, can we get to the bottom of this Da Vinci Code of tuning secrets? Has a Bach temperament solution miraculously appeared by way of a tantalising hint Bach may have left for us at the top of the title page of The Well-Tempered Clavier in the form of a cursive calligraphic flourish, a secret codified message, a memory jogging reminder; or was it even just a doodle?

Sadly, Lehman's "Bach temperament" is not only incomplete, but misleading, suggesting something which is neither probable, nor representative of the tuning traditions of Bach's time and likely vastly different from that which Bach knew, or used, or would have found acceptable. That the calligraphic scrolling glyph on the title page of The Well-Tempered Clavier is indeed a diagram of a temperament can be supported in that it can be broken down into structural elements which compare in structure and placement with intrinsic values of temperament intervals found elsewhere in the literature of the period. So how did he really tune his harpsichord?
This paper seeks to provide an overview of the Bach temperament issues raised by Bradley Lehman and attempts to provide an actual working historical temperament possibility as a Bach temperament. This paper is an abridged version and under review pending its full publication. In writing this paper I have carefully and intentionally avoided modern scholastic writings as much as possible and chosen to keep focus on historical work in order that subjective modern ideas not cloud the issues discussed. "
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Uploads
Papers by Dominic Eckersley
Despite some opinion that dogs were domesticated independently in the Old World and in the New, most consider domestication to have happened only once, possibly around 15,000 years ago in Asia. I propose that dogs were pre-domesticated either from wolves and/or wild dogs independently in different places and different times without human intervention and that subsequent hybridization of wolves and dogs in addition to cross breeding within a species both by, and without man, has occurred which completed the domestication process. I point further to the possible movement of man and animal between the Eurasian and American continents prior to, and during the exposure of the Bering land mass and after its submergence.

Sadly, Lehman's "Bach temperament" is not only incomplete, but misleading, suggesting something which is neither probable, nor representative of the tuning traditions of Bach's time and likely vastly different from that which Bach knew, or used, or would have found acceptable. That the calligraphic scrolling glyph on the title page of The Well-Tempered Clavier is indeed a diagram of a temperament can be supported in that it can be broken down into structural elements which compare in structure and placement with intrinsic values of temperament intervals found elsewhere in the literature of the period. So how did he really tune his harpsichord?
This paper seeks to provide an overview of the Bach temperament issues raised by Bradley Lehman and attempts to provide an actual working historical temperament possibility as a Bach temperament. This paper is an abridged version and under review pending its full publication. In writing this paper I have carefully and intentionally avoided modern scholastic writings as much as possible and chosen to keep focus on historical work in order that subjective modern ideas not cloud the issues discussed. "
Despite some opinion that dogs were domesticated independently in the Old World and in the New, most consider domestication to have happened only once, possibly around 15,000 years ago in Asia. I propose that dogs were pre-domesticated either from wolves and/or wild dogs independently in different places and different times without human intervention and that subsequent hybridization of wolves and dogs in addition to cross breeding within a species both by, and without man, has occurred which completed the domestication process. I point further to the possible movement of man and animal between the Eurasian and American continents prior to, and during the exposure of the Bering land mass and after its submergence.

Sadly, Lehman's "Bach temperament" is not only incomplete, but misleading, suggesting something which is neither probable, nor representative of the tuning traditions of Bach's time and likely vastly different from that which Bach knew, or used, or would have found acceptable. That the calligraphic scrolling glyph on the title page of The Well-Tempered Clavier is indeed a diagram of a temperament can be supported in that it can be broken down into structural elements which compare in structure and placement with intrinsic values of temperament intervals found elsewhere in the literature of the period. So how did he really tune his harpsichord?
This paper seeks to provide an overview of the Bach temperament issues raised by Bradley Lehman and attempts to provide an actual working historical temperament possibility as a Bach temperament. This paper is an abridged version and under review pending its full publication. In writing this paper I have carefully and intentionally avoided modern scholastic writings as much as possible and chosen to keep focus on historical work in order that subjective modern ideas not cloud the issues discussed. "