Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site pyuxd.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!gamma!pyuxww!pyuxd!rlr From: rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Professor Wagstaff) Newsgroups: net.music.classical,net.music.synth Subject: Re: Microtonal music questions Message-ID: <662@pyuxd.UUCP> Date: Mon, 11-Mar-85 21:26:18 EST Article-I.D.: pyuxd.662 Posted: Mon Mar 11 21:26:18 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 12-Mar-85 22:47:16 EST References: <520@ahuta.UUCP> Organization: Huxley College Lines: 47 Xref: watmath net.music.classical:975 net.music.synth:104 > Over the last couple of months I've been hearing more and more "microtonal" > music. (Microtonal music under anyone's definition is well-tempered to *n* > parts to an octave, where for some n>12 and for others simply n!=12.) > Does anyone know of albums of microtonal music in existance? Specific > artists to look out for? Which microtonal scales won't offend my western > ears? Which will? Which are vaguely "major"? "Minor"? Are there other > interesting questions I should be asking about microtonal music? > Doug Lewan (...!ihnp4!)ahuta!sam A good chunk of Charles Ives' music uses quarter-tones, utilizing the notes between the twelve notes (24 notes per octave). Apparently he and his family were taught this scaling in singing lessons from his father. (Ives was the first yuppie composer, being a successful accountant by day and a composer only in his spare time.) Other attempts at microtonal music involved scales of much more bizarre temperaments. A professor of mine (Joel Mandelbaum at Queens College) wrote his thesis on 19-note temperament and did further work into 31-note temperament. You may ask: why such bizarre numbers? First, twelve is a nearly perfect number considering its size: 2, 3, 4, and 6 go into it evenly, and thus the octave can be equally divided in any number of ways. One notices that the equal divisions of the octave seem to have come into vogue only in most recent memory (late 19th century) in a major way, because they evolved around a base of tonality: it is those equal divisions (tritone, augmented triad, diminished seventh, and whole tone scale as obtained by dividing by 2, 3, 4, and 6) that are the LEAST tonal, the least associated with a given key, and thus most used by experimenters in ambiguous tonal coloration like Debussy. The normal "tonalities" (or "keys") are based on UNequal divisions of the octave based on different points of origin (root of major scale and major triad). Using a PRIME number as the dividing factor might be thought to enable newer and richer types of tonalities, utilizing newer and more interesting divisions of the octave, with the possibility of still remaining close to a sense of "western" tonality in sound. Note that given a prime number, there is NO way to evenly divide the octave (except the unison and the octave itself). The other reason had to with a problem associated with tempered scales: a tempered interval does not accurately represent a natural interval. For instance a perfect fifth, in which the two notes have a frequency ratio of 3:2, is tuned slightly differently to this ratio in a tempered scale, much to the offense of some people's ears. The 19- and 31- note temperaments, while still a compromise, offer a fifth (and other intervals) much closer to the natural interval. Motorola made an instrument called the Scalatron which used a bizarre keyboard with an unusual layout to provide for 31-tone temperament. The color scheme was enough to put you in knots. Does anyone else remember it?