---
url: 'https://kalasudha.com/en-in/faq/instruments-artforms/can-a-harmonium-play-microtones'
title: 'Can a harmonium play microtones?'
author:
  name: rajeevk
  url: 'https://kalasudha.com/en-in/user/fce96177fd193d3a'
date: '2026-10-19T19:01:19+00:00'
updated: '2026-10-19T22:13:37+00:00'
type: website
summary: 'The harmonium plays in equal temperament; critics objected to this, and a 22-shruti harmonium built in London was off the market by 1928.'
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---
 

 FAQ · Instruments & artforms

# Can a harmonium play microtones?

 Updated 19 October 2026

 

The **[harmonium](/en-in/instrument/harmonium)** plays in equal temperament: in Bengal its scale was changed to an equally tempered one so players could change key. Early critics, among them Rabindranath Tagore, Ananda Coomaraswamy and A. H. Fox Strangways, objected to that tempered tuning, Joep Bor records. H. Keatley Moore built a harmonium tuned to 22 shrutis in London. It was used in scale research but could not compete commercially, and it was off the market by 1928.



 

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- [   Harmonium The harmonium is a hand-pumped reed organ of Hindustani classical, devotional and semi-classical music, introduced in the 19th century and standard in Indian…     ](/en-in/instrument/harmonium)
 
  

 

 

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