Western orchestral tuning pitch has risen historically for a brighter sound

Evidence

The reference frequency commonly used in Western music is 440 Hz for the note A. The reference has changed with time, and the overall tendency has been upwards in pitch to obtain a brighter sound for classical orchestras (Rossing et al., 2001). The figure also shows the relative frequency of occurrence of different tones in five randomly selected piano sonatas by Beethoven. It is clear that most of the notes reside in the frequency region between 50 Hz and 2000 Hz, although outliers also exist. Since the piano is an instrument with one of the largest ranges of notes, this frequency region can be taken in general as an example of the most commonly found range of pitches in tonal music. — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 1099

Categorization

• XREF: Pairs with the reader’s Complaints About Immodesty piece on shifting cultural norms, and general material on how standards drift over time.
• SHARE: Send to a musician friend into tuning/intonation history — the rising 440 reference frequency detail.