Thanks Ron, I am mostly interested in how you think either one of them makes the piano sound as compared with yours or any other very mild WT.

One of my local colleagues has only used mild meantones for many years now. His preference is the 1/7 comma meantone which has either 3.1 or 3.0 cent tempered 5ths, depending on how you decide to round off the figures. (21.5 divided by 7 = 3.07). It is an 18th Century style (and strength) Meantone along the lines of Young and Vallotti. He does like the two which I posted as well, when he feels he must go with a Meantone "Lite".

Here's something to consider which I have never seen anyone else discuss: When you tune ET with a calculated program, the stretch applied to the octaves, whether a little or a lot, pulls the tempering out of the 5ths (makes them closer to pure) and puts width in the single octaves. 5ths and 12ths eventually become pure. The more stretch, the sooner that happens.

When stretch is applied to any WT, the 5ths which are pure in the temperament octave become widened and thus tempered in a way which is not really intended. The way I tune the octaves, I keep the pureness of the 5ths which are pure in the temperament octave much higher up than a calculated program will dictate.

Therefore, I'm not sure whether any version of the EBVT can have any quality which distinguishes itself very much from any other mild WT when tuned using a calculated program.

When I have tuned the Vallotti temperament aurally, I have used the same method for tuning the octaves as I have described. The tuning provides remarkable clarity to the music played on the piano. I still have a recording of when I tuned a piano this way in February 1990 for the Beethoven Emperor Piano Concerto. I would characterize the sound of the piano as having a "razor sharp, in tune sound".

When tuning any Meantone temperament, the calculated program treats all 5ths equally, the same as it does in ET. In any Meantone, all 5ths are tempered equally (except the one wide "wolf" 5th). In the 1/9 Comma Meantone, that wide 5th is virtually the same amount wide as all others are narrow. Therefore, a calculated program tends not to distort a Meantone the way it would any WT.

I attended Bernhard Stopper's class at the Convention in Anaheim. The C Major arpeggio was tried on his tuning. While C Major sounded more active in his version of ET than it does in my EBVT, that same "pipe organ effect" was heard. I believe this was because he had a much higher incidence of coincident partial alignment than can be achieved with any other amount of octave stretch. The Stopper tuning is well known for its remarkable clarity.

I just tried EBVT III with Ron's stretch style, using Verituner as tuning aid, on my Sauter Omega 220. Very nice. The voice is open, brilliant but still rounded. Of course, I can't replicate the way Bill stretches octaves but the result is still very pleasing nonetheless.

EBVT III with Verituner's standard Expanded style does not work well. The notes from A0 to G#1 are tuned between 12 to 25 cents too flat.

I've experienced very similar results. I end up 18 cents flat at A0. I switched to Ron's stretch style, and also using his Koval 2.0. The result is excellent. I'm sure Bill's EVBT would be great too with Ron's stretch, but for now I've got Koval tuned in. I tried Koval 2.0 with the expanded, clean, and average stretch. All styles had issues, but even so the expanded was probably the best. Oh, this is on an 1891 S&S D rebuilt by Dave Hughes last year. Wonderful piano.

Bill, I see there is a lot of emphasis in the discussion here on the pureness of the fifths and eating up the comma with the wider OTS. The effects talked about weighs heavy on the major chord sound but what happens to the progressive beat rates of the m3rd and M6. As you mentioned about a wide 5th the same amount as the others are narrow(1/9 comma mean tone); would this not stick out as being to slow or fast when looking at its RBI relationship to the notes around it?