MSORET raises the question of musical pitch, and advocates A 432, long ago proposed by M. Meerens, of Belgium. It is rather curious that in Belgium itself M. Meerens's proposal was considered and rejected by a Commission appointed in 1877, upon whose report the French pitch A 435 was adopted by Royal decree on March 19 of this year. There seems to be very little difference between the two; it amounts, in fact, to exactly 12 cents or hundredths of an equal semitone, of which 211/2 make a comma. Hence there is no practical reason for making the change as affecting singers. But no instruments made for A 435 would be available for A 432, so that the advantage of uniformity would be lost, without any advantage to the voice or the quality of instruments. The arguments in its favour are almost entirely arithmetical. To begin with the inaudible i vibration and proceed by exact doubling to 64 is an arithmetical dream. It is true that König, by a most ingenious adaptation of a large tuning-fork acting in place of a pendulum to a clock going in a room at 20° C. (for about five days in a year), has succeeded in making a fork of that precise number of vibrations at that precise temperature. But at 15° C, the temperature adopted for the French diapason normal (standard fork), the pitch of this would not be 64, but, to take König's numbers, 64.036. The charm of the arithmetic vanishes, therefore, with a slight alteration of temperature, and the pitch has become fully cent (hundredth of a semitone) sharper. Granted that this is an imperceptible amount, yet it is enough to alter the whole of the arithmetic. Then the arithmetic is itself founded on just intonation, which is not adopted anywhere. If we take the equal temperament, now generally accepted, we should get for A 432 the values C 256.9, C# 272.2, D 288.3, D#305.5, E 323.6, F 342.9, F# 363.3, G384.9, G# 407-8, A 432, A# 457.7, 6473.9, 513.8. There is nothing charming here. M. Soret, in his table, quietly ignores the chromatic notes and the equal temperament. If, however, we took C 256 as the starting-point, the A of C major in just intonation would not be 432, but, as he owns, a comma flatter, 426.67. He bases everything physically on the violin, which is tuned in D and not in C, or the viola and violoncello, which are both tuned in G, not in C, and hence even for these instruments, with the great assumption of just intonation, his use of the major scale of C is incorrect.2 The reasons that are to guide us in the choice of a pitch must certainly not be arithmetical. For more than two centuries up to 1813, when the Philharmonic Society was founded, all Europe used a pitch within a comma either way of Handel's fork A 422.5. Then, owing to the presentation of new instruments by the Emperor of Russia to a Vienna regiment at the Congress of Vienna, pitch rose gradually but slowly. In 1826 our Philharmonic Society, under Sir G. Smart, adopted A 433, between M. Soret's and French pitch, and this was known for many years in London as the Philharmonic pitch. France adopted A 435 in 1859. Under Costa our pitch rose to its present height, A 4547. But our army pitch, used at Kneller Hall, and adopted for the forthcoming Exhibition, is A 452. Now, the trouble is that our classical composers wrote their music for Handel's pitch, while since 1860 Continental composers have used French pitch, and English composers our high pitch. The first and last may compromise with the second, but are incompatible with each other. To sing Handel in modern English pitch is to unduly strain voices and spoil the effect originally intended. But we submit to it even in Handel festivals. There is a greater difficulty in altering pitch in England than on the Continent. We have no subsidised Conservatoires or theatres to which we can say: “Use this standard of pitch, or go without subsidy.” Even regimental bands are not supplied at the expense of the State. A new set of instruments is very costly, and more than that, it is long before makers learn how to manufacture correctly to a new pitch. The question is therefore beset with difficulties. But the solution is certainly not to be found in the arithmetic of M. Soret.