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by analog31 1600 days ago
Indeed, temperament is its own technology. I assume that the music, technology, and culture co-evolved. And nothing stays constant for a millennium. Temperaments were developed and refined as music began making fuller use of the available scales and chords. Yet each system had to be within the capabilities of musicians to tune their own instruments. A harpsichord had to be tuned before every performance. Equal temperament had to wait until instruments (the modern piano) were stable enough to stay in tune between visits of the technician.

To make just temperament sound "good" even relative to the ears of another time period, probably required playing music written for that particular tuning.

As a double bassist, playing pitches repeatably enough to claim any specific temperament would be a lifelong challenge, if it's even attainable. Most of the time, musicians don't think about temperaments. We try to play in tune and sound good.