More JI/ET

Thanks to those who made comments about my JI/ET post...here's a few more thoughts on the subject in response. First, there's a lot of different styles of blues. Sure, JI can work for some styles...I was just listening to Catler's new CD a few minutes ago, and I like it better each time I hear it. But, would JI work for Charlie Parker's "Blues For Alice?" Wes Montgomery's "West Coast Blues?" Or, how about Count Basie/Johnny Otis style big band blues? I've played a lot of Freddy Greene style rhythm guitar over the years, I don't think it would translate to JI tuning so well. Or, how about Piedmont, John Hurt, or Merle Travis style blues? And, you can find the 1-4-5 progression in most styles of American roots music from Buck Owens to Carl Perkins to Bill Monroe...maybe JI could be made to work in those styles, but it might be a real stretch, and not very practical. And, in the long or short run, this is all about actually playing music, what works and what doesn't.

Sure, there's always exceptions to about anything one could say about art...and great artists are very adept at blowing our minds, so I'm always open for those who change our preconceptions. But, I was trying to make a general point about equal temps as opposed to pure tunings, and I think it's valid...temps were developed by Europeans to modulate from key to key in a complex manner, I think that's pretty well known and accepted. And, maqam/raga types of music do not modulate like Western music (I believe they do modulate in a simpler fashion at times), so of course one scale can be used for a particular piece in these styles without tempering...again, no debate there.

And, as a matter of fact, I do compose in pure tunings...there's 2 fretless pieces on my new CD that use scales I made up from the Harmonic Series...I have plans for others in the future as well. I've also done numerous gigs with Catler over the years, including 2 in 2006...we correspond fairly regularly, and I think he's a great unsung innovator. I've listened to a lot of his music over the years.
Also know Dante Rosati, stayed with him last year in NYC...a maestro for sure, and a very interesting composer...best from Colorado...Hstick

myspace.com/microstick guitar9.com

Never thought I'd be the one to defend JI, but Mr. Haverstick, I still
think you are mistaken about a few things.

Rather than going at length to prove exceptions to your
generalization, I'm gonna say this: if you want to generalize as such,
I'd like to see some evidence of people who have *tried and failed* to
apply JI in the areas you've said that JI is not good for.

It's meaningless to say that JI doesn't work for certain things, or
isn't suited for certain things, when one cannot provide examples of
music that shows JI's ill-suitedness. If people *can* make good JI
music in the styles you mentioned (and they can indeed, as Catler
Rosati McRae Riley Partch etc. have proven), then the burden is on you
to show people who have encountered in their own music the limitations
of JI. I personally cannot think of a single composer who has tried
to do a certain style of music in JI and has just not been able to do
it, so that leads me to conclude that any style of music that can be
done in Equal Temperament can just as well (and perhaps just as
easily) be done in JI.

I mean, what exactly is the point of your generalization, any way?
I'm certain you don't wish to disparage or discourage any composers of
JI music, so I'm some what at a loss to see what you'd accomplish by
asserting and proving that JI "just ain't so hot" for certain styles
of music.

Sorry if I seem a bit agitated here, I'm just not too keen on
disparaging generalizations, as I often see them leveled against
tunings that I don't feel are deserving of them.

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Neil Haverstick"
<microstick@...> wrote:
> But, would JI work for Charlie Parker's "Blues For Alice?" Wes
Montgomery's
> "West Coast Blues?" Or, how about Count Basie/Johnny Otis style big
band

Oooh, that sounds like a challenge! I wouldn't mind hearing an
attempt to do any of the above in JI!

Hi Igliashon,

Please permit me to enter here on Neil's behalf. I've a few annecdotals
about some JI flops.

The worst flop for me was an Ezra Sims piece I played with newband decades
ago. The piece made use of a full JS Bach work, immigrated to just
intonation. Damn, there were bad vibes after that performance. The piece was never
done again. Bach was ruined in a way I have not heard since.

Another example is Brahms. The AFMM performed the second clarinet concerto
in Kirnberger III. The audience was stunned; the Brahms was so limp. It had
one of what we relished from the piece. It was emasculated. I now believe
Brahms requires ET for music with piano. This was the disconnect Brahms has
with the Bach initiated world (that goes through Beethoven). Brahms, knew.
When Brahms uses natural horn, it is for timbre.

A third example is the blues. I've probably played more concerts with Jon
Catler than anyone on this list. As he moved to a 60 cycle fundamental,
minimalism, and new bands, we moved in different directions. I'm really happy for
his JI Blues and Country jaunts. But for me, Blues is the friction of
microtones against a tempered reality. I don't get the raw joy playing microtonal
blues invented for guitar at a new pitch standard, at least not as a
bassoonist. But I love a blues where I set it up. :)

best, Johnny Reinhard

************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hello Mr. Reinhard, and thank you for your reply. However, I think
you may have misunderstood what I'm looking for. Mr. Haverstick made
a rather bold statement: "so, generally, if one wants to play
classical, jazz, American folk, blues, country, reggae,flamenco, rock,
R&B, etc, you're going to be dealing with a temperament." This may be
true as a matter of empirical observation of contingent facts of
western culture (i.e. 99.999% of people playing these styles play in
equal temperament, with 99.998% playing in 12-tone equal temperament)
but it just doesn't imply universal necessity! If there exists
classical, jazz, blues, country, rock etc. music in JI, this
invalidates the claim that "generally, you're going to be dealing with
a temperament" if you want to play these styles.

Now, this bold claim seems to have been abandoned, and what really
seems to be being claimed here, by Neil and yourself (at least judging
by your examples), is that while one CAN do any style one pleases in
JI, it *just won't sound good* if it's one of the styles (or
sub-styles) mentioned by Neil. This is a much different claim. I
can't really contest it, taste being subjective and all, but it seems
there's just as much evidence that these styles played in alternate
EDOs are just as bad. So what one can logically conclude from this
evidence is not that equal temperaments *in general* are better for
these styles, but rather that *12-tone equal temperament* is better
for these styles (since that's the tuning in which these styles
originated, approximately speaking).

Bach and Brahms would sound just as bad (if not worse) in, say,
17-EDO; flamenco in 16-EDO would perhaps be atrocious; reggae in
15-EDO would possibly be ridiculous; jazz in 10-EDO would likely be
unrecognizable (though I hope to see even these generalizations
disproven in my lifetime)...but one obviously can't generalize from
the failures of one temperament, or even MANY temperaments, to the
failure of ALL temperaments, for clearly all of these styles DO work
just fine 12-EDO, and probably 19-EDO or 31-EDO (or even 26, 29, or
22-EDO for that matter). So it still stands to reason that one cannot
generalize from the failure of one set (or even MANY sets) of JI
pitches to the failure of ALL sets of JI pitches to accomplish certain
stylistic goals; one simply may not have tried the right set of
pitches, and since there are more possible pitch-sets in JI
(uncountably infinite, as opposed to the countable infinity of EDOs),
one will likely have to sift through more sets before one finds the
good ones for playing western music.

So, in summary, Neil's claims about the stylistic limitations of JI
are statistically correct but logically invalid, and if that isn't
clear by now, I can't make it so by typing more characters.

At any rate, this is just getting too ironic for me to continue,
seeing as how I don't even like playing in JI myself and would be just
as happy never to hear it spoken of here again (as it typically bores
me to tears, though to a lesser degree than the high-cardinality EDO
stuff--but as I said, that's just me, and I wouldn't expect anyone
else to agree).

***So can we all just agree that this is not the place to make
disparaging generalizations about the musical possibilities of certain
tunings, and get on with the making of micro music?***

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Afmmjr@... wrote:
>
> Hi Igliashon,
>
> Please permit me to enter here on Neil's behalf. I've a few
annecdotals
> about some JI flops.
>
> The worst flop for me was an Ezra Sims piece I played with newband
decades
> ago. The piece made use of a full JS Bach work, immigrated to just
> intonation. Damn, there were bad vibes after that performance. The
piece was never
> done again. Bach was ruined in a way I have not heard since.
>
> Another example is Brahms. The AFMM performed the second clarinet
concerto
> in Kirnberger III. The audience was stunned; the Brahms was so
limp. It had
> one of what we relished from the piece. It was emasculated. I now
believe
> Brahms requires ET for music with piano. This was the disconnect
Brahms has
> with the Bach initiated world (that goes through Beethoven).
Brahms, knew.
> When Brahms uses natural horn, it is for timbre.
>
> A third example is the blues. I've probably played more concerts
with Jon
> Catler than anyone on this list. As he moved to a 60 cycle
fundamental,
> minimalism, and new bands, we moved in different directions. I'm
really happy for
> his JI Blues and Country jaunts. But for me, Blues is the friction of
> microtones against a tempered reality. I don't get the raw joy
playing microtonal
> blues invented for guitar at a new pitch standard, at least not as a
> bassoonist. But I love a blues where I set it up. :)
>
> best, Johnny Reinhard
>
>
>
> ************************************** See what's free at
http://www.aol.com.
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Afmmjr@... wrote:
> But for me, Blues is the friction of
> microtones against a tempered reality.

I agree, and I think that the history loaded into that concept is far
too obvious and powerful to ignore. But I'd put it the other way
around: blues is the friction of realities against an artificial
structure. Yes I'm calling tones coming out of the audible harmonic
series more natural or at least closer to the mother than tempered
tones, and post-modernism, which is the beatification of channel-
surfing, can kiss my ass. The tuning of the blues, as characteristic
and defining blue notes within an imposed alien structure, tells a
story in itself. Playing the blues in either JI or ET tells other
stories.

-Cameron Bobro

I just wanted to make clear that in no way was I intending to connect my
view of playing against a just scale for a blues with Jon Catler's recent album,
which I have not yet fully heard. I was speaking about my personal view as
a player of bassoon playing blues. Jon is able to capture wonderful things
in whatever tuning he chooses.

Johnny Reinhard

************************************** See what's free at http://www.aol.com.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]