Gene's music

Speaking of playlists, this could be the makings
of a string quartet

Nonaginta et novem
Clinton variations
Choraled
Chromosound

Gene, you should re-render Nonaginta et novem with
clearer / more aggressive timbres. Also, both the
ogg and MIDI version I have here seem to end ubruptly.

Then get the scores into human-readable form while
transcribing for quartet.

I think it could be one of the best pieces of
microtonal music ever written.

-Carl

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Carl Lumma <ekin@...> wrote:

> I think it could be one of the best pieces of
> microtonal music ever written.

Wow, Carl. Thanks for the vote of confindence.

I was thinking of doing another string quartet movement with a similar
feel to Choraled as my next project, actually, or else going back and
working again on stuff in the unfinished projects bin. I'll think
about this idea.

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Carl Lumma <ekin@...> wrote:
>
> Speaking of playlists, this could be the makings
> of a string quartet
>
> Nonaginta et novem
> Clinton variations
> Choraled
> Chromosound

Here's a question: a lot of my music works pretty well in 99 equal
temperament; in particular, the first three pieces above could all be
performed in 99-et. Of course, using sagittal or whatever, 99-et could
be notated. The question is, could this be done so that performers
would be willing to perform it?

>> Speaking of playlists, this could be the makings
>> of a string quartet
>>
>> Nonaginta et novem
>> Clinton variations
>> Choraled
>> Chromosound
>
>Here's a question: a lot of my music works pretty well in 99 equal
>temperament; in particular, the first three pieces above could all
>be performed in 99-et. Of course, using sagittal or whatever, 99-et
>could be notated. The question is, could this be done so that
>performers would be willing to perform it?

Performers shouldn't have to know anything about the ET. They have
a computer version to listen to, they have accidentals that tell them
the rough locations of the pitches. Ideally they would have monitors
or headphones, at least for rehearsal, in which they could create
their own mix of the live sound and the various parts of the computer
version.

Whether you can find any willing performers is a question. You'll
need a human-readable score first, then shop it in the manner Daniel
suggested, then shop it in the manner I suggested. For string
quartet, there's some transcribing to do for these on top of any
microtonal concerns.

There are several different versions of sagittal. I've never seen
a sagittal score that I considered appropriately-notated, but I
haven't looked at many and I'm willing to be surprised.

For music like this, my generalized-diatonic approach isn't
applicable either. Probably the best bet is a schismatic (58 & 27)
chain-of-fifths notation with 7 nominals and custom accidentals.
But you know more about this facet of notation than I do.

-Carl

I've got a few Gene pieces on my iPod.

It sounds like you've got some kind of process going, and you let it go for 10 minutes or whatever. That's cool, but I wonder if it's possible to (just as something new to try):

1) Keep the pitch, or rather pitch-class structure part of the process intact. (The octaves where notes occur may be somewhat flexible?)

2) Every 16 or 32 measures, change texture. Waltz, March, sad aria, one florid line, 6 lines of counterpoint, 2 voices plus chords, fast scherzo, etc. etc.

3) Also, have some parameters gradually change over the course of a work: an "arch-form" of loudness, or registral width (overall compass of all voices), or density, tempo.

I generally find it works well to have some parameters change gradually in a controlled fashion, just a couple of them, and everything else is just free fantasy, changing iregularly, on a whim, fairly frequently.

Maybe you've already done this. I dunno. It's what I would like to try if I had your pitch-structural "chops". Maybe you don't care what I would do, why should you. but there you have it.

C Bailey