
A London Orchestra Broke International Law [video] - camtarn
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzznBt8tVnI
======
camtarn
Anti-clickbait description: the international pitch to which orchestras should
tune was actually specified in the Treaty of Versailles, of all places, as
435Hz. Orchestras can gain a slight 'brightness' advantage over others by
playing very slightly sharp, so one London orchestra used a rather interesting
interpretation of the rules to allow it to stretch the pitch upwards by a few
Hz, thus technically breaking international law. But the rest of the story is
also worth watching.

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benj111
_The_ treaty of Versailles?

How did that come about?

British: Your troops are retreating, your civilians are starving, surrender
now.

Germany: Ok

France: And you will tune your instruments to 435hz

Germany: Noooooooo....

Edit: Still havent got a reason, this adds more detail but says 440hz?
[http://capionlarsen.com/history-pitch/](http://capionlarsen.com/history-
pitch/)

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moehm
The treaty of Versailles specifies a lot more than this. See e.g. here[0] for
article 274 and 275, which basically say, that Champagne and Cognac is only
produced in France.

[0]
[https://net.lib.byu.edu/~rdh7/wwi/versa/versa9.html](https://net.lib.byu.edu/~rdh7/wwi/versa/versa9.html)

~~~
benj111
Interesting. That whole section reads as a (one way?) free trade agreement. I
know the treaty was intended to punish Germany, and that would fit.

Frequency standardisation, not so much.

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thyrsus
As a bigot of binary, I prefer C 256, which gives A ~430.5 in a well-tempered
system. Come get me, Interpol!

