Ideal Tunings for Realtime Key Changes - making them musician friendly and consistent

On 22 Jan 2006, at 14:49, MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com wrote:
>

>
> Hi Dr. David,
>
> on Sat, 21 Jan 2006 Jon Szanto wrote:
>>
> [snip]
>>> The product is virtually ready to go to market now. With the >>> exception of completing the internal tunings, an extra feature or >>> two, and some documentation, the project is complete.
>>
>> I see. Well, then, I'll be happy to download a demo as soon as you >> post a link... ;)
>
> Ditto! Jon's suggestions for the preset tunings
> are very good, I think. Please include something
> capable of good barbershop harmony, too!

The way in which I have produced the LucyTuning tables are always derived from A=440 Hz; so that all LucyTuned instruments (real or virtual) can play with eachother in tune.

For musicians this make live much easier than other systems, as a LucyTuned C, C# or Cx etc always uses the same name for the same pitch.

The method I use may require longer and more microtuning files than merely expressing the interval sizes; but it makes it much easier in practice for musicians to use
as they simply set everything to a 12 tone ET A, and then the musos know which notes and chords are playable from the note names.

This arrangement enables users to write their compositions in regular 12edo midi, and choose the appropriate LucyTuning dependent upon the key of the harmony in the piece.
All "real" musicians seem to immediately understand microtuning when conceptualised in this way, and just select which LucyTuning that they want from the menu.
e.g. 0b5s; 5b0s; 3b2s; etc. as all musos know the circle/spiral of fourths and fifths, and hence the logic of sharps and flats, and can read musical notation.

I appreciate that this is different to how other systems have been applied in scala and other systems.
Being a musician as much as if not more than an engineer or mathematician; I think like a musician.
As my mother was a musician and music teacher, I was educated in traditional harmony from a very early age, before I could read or even knew my multiplication tables, and many years before I studied and was qualified in engineering.

Please remember that whatever weird and wonderful maths may be used to calculate microtunings, ultimately it is all about making music;
music is played by musicians;
so please make your microtuning presentations be musician friendly;-)

Charles Lucy - lucy@...
------------ Promoting global harmony through LucyTuning -------
for information on LucyTuning go to: http://www.lucytune.com
for LucyTuned Lullabies go to http://www.lullabies.co.uk
Buy/download/CD from: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/lucytuned2