13-Limit chorales

>
> I mean, do people ever do four-part 13 limit voice leading, with
>inversions etc, ala a Bach chorale? Maybe David Doty does..
>
>I haven't tried, but I imagine inversions of 13-limit JI chords can get
>quite
>gnarly....
>

I believe in his book he refers to 13-intervals as "intolerable" or
something like that.

But I don't know, I don't think a "Drone" per se is necessary . . I think
just that a local "root" is necessary to avoid total unpleasantness (of
course you might not be interested in avoiding it) . . . and you'd just
need that at the moment that you heard a 13 interval. So yeah, I could
imagine 4-part voice-leading with 13-intervals, but all of the harmonies
would be in root position :) Which might not be as dull as it sounds
voice-leading wise, since you'd have a lot more intervals available to
put above each bass note.

Anyay. . .this is one of my faorite Kyle Gann tunes I think. The 13
sounds completely natural here.

actually i remember years ago a conversation with Doty (one of the few we have had in person) where he said he preferred 13 over 11s. I believe that Rod Poole also likes them more but don't hold me to that, as like myself goes in and out of certain areas. Both Cris Forster and david rosenthal and maybe even phillip Blackburns are 13 limits.

11 sounds strange in big part possibly to how akward they are if one tries to keep a 12 tone matrix, even though i can be done, it tend to want to go other places.

i might tend to lean toward a preferance for 13 over 11 too, but i no longer work with the concept of limits at all and haven't had the resources to pursue them with instruments. if and when i might return to such directions, i would use them in an eikosany long before i would ever allow myself to fall into the black hole of a diamond ( i am really kidding!)

Christopher Bailey wrote:

>>I mean, do people ever do four-part 13 limit voice leading, with
>>inversions etc, ala a Bach chorale? Maybe David Doty does..
>>
>>I haven't tried, but I imagine inversions of 13-limit JI chords can get
>>quite >>gnarly.... >>
>> >>
>
>I believe in his book he refers to 13-intervals as "intolerable" or >something like that. >
>But I don't know, I don't think a "Drone" per se is necessary . . I think >just that a local "root" is necessary to avoid total unpleasantness (of >course you might not be interested in avoiding it) . . . and you'd just >need that at the moment that you heard a 13 interval. So yeah, I could >imagine 4-part voice-leading with 13-intervals, but all of the harmonies >would be in root position :) Which might not be as dull as it sounds >voice-leading wise, since you'd have a lot more intervals available to >put above each bass note.
>
>Anyay. . .this is one of my faorite Kyle Gann tunes I think. The 13 >sounds completely natural here.
>
>
>
>
> >Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
> >
>
>
> >

--
Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/>
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU <http://www.kxlu.com/main.html> 88.9 FM Wed 8-9 pm Los Angeles

On Tuesday 15 November 2005 9:10 am, Kraig Grady wrote:
> actually i remember years ago a conversation with Doty (one of the few
> we have had in person) where he said he preferred 13 over 11s. I believe
> that Rod Poole also likes them more but don't hold me to that, as like
> myself goes in and out of certain areas. Both Cris Forster and david
> rosenthal and maybe even phillip Blackburns are 13 limits.
>
> 11 sounds strange in big part possibly to how akward they are if one
> tries to keep a 12 tone matrix, even though i can be done, it tend to
> want to go other places.
>
> i might tend to lean toward a preferance for 13 over 11 too, but i no
> longer work with the concept of limits at all and haven't had the
> resources to pursue them with instruments. if and when i might return to
> such directions, i would use them in an eikosany long before i would
> ever allow myself to fall into the black hole of a diamond ( i am really
> kidding!)

I like to use 11 and 13 JI in strictly overtone based drone music, for a kind
of mystical effect.

Other than that, my natural thinking tends to be 2,3,5,7, for whatever reason.
And obviously, compositionally, I tend to like consistant interval sizes for
things like transposed motifs, etc. hence my finding EDOs or ETs useful. (not
that I want to start another silly JI vs. ET feud---for the record, both
modes of thinking are really cool and really useful and really adorable and
cuddly)

-Aaron.

On Tuesday 15 November 2005 7:40 am, Christopher Bailey wrote:
> > I mean, do people ever do four-part 13 limit voice leading, with
> >inversions etc, ala a Bach chorale? Maybe David Doty does..
> >
> >I haven't tried, but I imagine inversions of 13-limit JI chords can get
> >quite
> >gnarly....
>
> I believe in his book he refers to 13-intervals as "intolerable" or
> something like that.
>
> But I don't know, I don't think a "Drone" per se is necessary . . I think
> just that a local "root" is necessary to avoid total unpleasantness (of
> course you might not be interested in avoiding it) . . . and you'd just
> need that at the moment that you heard a 13 interval. So yeah, I could
> imagine 4-part voice-leading with 13-intervals, but all of the harmonies
> would be in root position :) Which might not be as dull as it sounds
> voice-leading wise, since you'd have a lot more intervals available to
> put above each bass note.

As soon as I posted I realized of course, that the answer would be
Debussy/Ravel type parallelism of the 13-limit chords.

But I think we agree that using inversions with these upper partials as the
lowest note is out of the question unless we enjoy making people cringe at
the though of microtonal music.

> Anyay. . .this is one of my faorite Kyle Gann tunes I think. The 13
> sounds completely natural here.

agreed.

-Aaron.

I think some of Lou Harrisons gamelan ensembles does exactly this type of thing and doesn't make us cringe at all.
Aaron Krister Johnson wrote:

>
>
>But I think we agree that using inversions with these upper partials as the >lowest note is out of the question unless we enjoy making people cringe at >the though of microtonal music.
>
>
> >

--
Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/>
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU <http://www.kxlu.com/main.html> 88.9 FM Wed 8-9 pm Los Angeles

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Christopher Bailey
<chris@m...> wrote:
>
> >
> > I mean, do people ever do four-part 13 limit voice leading, with
> >inversions etc, ala a Bach chorale? Maybe David Doty does..
> >
> >I haven't tried, but I imagine inversions of 13-limit JI chords
can get
> >quite
> >gnarly....
> >
>
> I believe in his book he refers to 13-intervals as "intolerable" or
> something like that.
>
> But I don't know, I don't think a "Drone" per se is necessary . .
I think
> just that a local "root" is necessary to avoid total
unpleasantness (of
> course you might not be interested in avoiding it) . . . and you'd
just
> need that at the moment that you heard a 13 interval. So yeah, I
could
> imagine 4-part voice-leading with 13-intervals, but all of the
harmonies
> would be in root position :) Which might not be as dull as it
sounds
> voice-leading wise, since you'd have a lot more intervals
available to
> put above each bass note.

But I think chords like 3:5:7:13, 3:5:9:13, 3:5:11:13, 3:7:9:13,
5:7:9:13, etc. (the numbers don't have to be all odd) are often
pleasant too! Don't you?

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Aaron Krister Johnson <aaron@a...> wrote:

> I like to use 11 and 13 JI in strictly overtone based drone music, for a kind
> of mystical effect.
>

Of course I didn't mean to imply that drone music is lacking in any respect. I think
listeners love drones for the same reason composers do - for the stability they impart and
melodic subtlety they allow. And the world music tradition I envy most is Indian. The final
scene of my Custer and Sitting Bull is over a drone, and I chose that because I thought
audiences would respond to it powerfully - which they seem to. I'm just too Western and
too figured-bass trained to want to do *only* that.

I'm with you - let every possible kind of tuning flourish. You could have told me that
"Study for KG" was 79-limit with a hexadecimal eikosany in a 23-29-31-37-41-43
diamond, and how would I have known different? :^D

Cheers,

Kyle

On Tue, 15 Nov 2005, Aaron Krister Johnson wrote:
>
> As soon as I posted I realized of course, that the answer would be
> Debussy/Ravel type parallelism of the 13-limit chords.
>
> But I think we agree that using inversions with these upper partials as
the
> lowest note is out of the question unless we enjoy making people cringe at
> the though of microtonal music.

Aaron,
Not necessarily! I think that the amount of cringe depends largely
on the satisfaction the listener gets from the _relative_ resolution
of discords. Anything that ends more discordantly than it began is
usually unsatisfying, and vice versa.

Also, the relative consonance of any of these chords depends on
how many of the chord notes are present and how many omitted;
more open chords have fewer intervals and may appear more
restful. For example, in jazz a 13th chord rarely has all of tonic,
third, fifth, seventh, ninth, eleventh and thirteenth present, does
it? All that's required is that the most _characteristic_ intervals
of the chord are present. This works for all inversions of those
chords. I think the same would apply to higher limit chords; there's
no reason in principle why even two- or three-part writing might not
employ chords of various limits up to a stated maximum, with both
partial and full cadences crafted by moving form higher to lower
limits.

A particular kind of bass line for such music, as I described
earlier in reply to Kyle, that "walks" the scale or the chord - rather
than walking the cycle of fifths (or substitutes) as in 3-limit music
- seems to me particularly appropriate as a foundation for creating
such a harmonic flow. I think I may have to find a spare week (over
Christmas?) to try to realise these ideas in composition ... :-)

Regards,
Yahya

--
No virus found in this outgoing message.
Checked by AVG Free Edition.
Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.13.3/172 - Release Date: 15/11/05

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Aaron Krister Johnson
<aaron@a...> wrote:

for the record, both
> modes of thinking are really cool and really useful and really
adorable and
> cuddly)
>
> -Aaron.
>

Wouldn't that tend to make them popular? ;-)

-P

On Tuesday 15 November 2005 9:48 am, Kraig Grady wrote:
> I think some of Lou Harrisons gamelan ensembles does exactly this type
> of thing and doesn't make us cringe at all.

I can see why not, too---metallaphones can make anything sound reasonably
good!

I should have said a typical bright timbre like a harpsichord or sawtooth wave
would do the trick...

-Aaron.

> Aaron Krister Johnson wrote:
> >But I think we agree that using inversions with these upper partials as
> > the lowest note is out of the question unless we enjoy making people
> > cringe at the though of microtonal music.

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Aaron Krister Johnson
<aaron@a...> wrote:
>
> On Tuesday 15 November 2005 7:40 am, Christopher Bailey wrote:
> > > I mean, do people ever do four-part 13 limit voice leading, with
> > >inversions etc, ala a Bach chorale? Maybe David Doty does..
> > >
> > >I haven't tried, but I imagine inversions of 13-limit JI chords
can get quite
> > >gnarly....
> >
> > I believe in his book he refers to 13-intervals as "intolerable"
or
> > something like that.
> >
> > But I don't know, I don't think a "Drone" per se is
necessary . . I think
> > just that a local "root" is necessary to avoid total
unpleasantness (of
> > course you might not be interested in avoiding it) . . . and
you'd just
> > need that at the moment that you heard a 13 interval. So yeah, I
could
> > imagine 4-part voice-leading with 13-intervals, but all of the
harmonies
> > would be in root position :) Which might not be as dull as it
sounds
> > voice-leading wise, since you'd have a lot more intervals
available to
> > put above each bass note.
>
> As soon as I posted I realized of course, that the answer would be
> Debussy/Ravel type parallelism of the 13-limit chords.
>
> But I think we agree that using inversions with these upper
partials as the
> lowest note is out of the question unless we enjoy making people
cringe at
> the though of microtonal music.

Should you be interested in an invertible 13-limit chord, I suggest
you try this one (listed here in all of its inversions):

8:11:14:20:26
10:13:16:22:28
11:14:20:26:32
13:16:22:28:40
7:10:13:16:22

A common difference tone tends to give this chord a cohesive
(or "believable") sound, but since there is no perfect 5th or 4th
present, I expect that it would most likely be treated as a
dissonance.

For 4-part harmony, simply omit one of the notes, as determined by
what gives you the most satisfactory voice-leading.

--George