Re: [MMM] stringed instruments I use in my recordings

Unfortunately a lot of the url's don't work. I usually use the 'Rich-Text Editor (Beta)' in the yahoo group web interface when posting url's. Even if the group strips all the html, the links still work. Weirdly, I can't find this post in the web interface.

Joe

----- Original Message ----
From: daniel_anthony_stearns <daniel_anthony_stearns@...>
To: MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sunday, July 8, 2007 12:57:05 AM
Subject: [MMM] stringed instruments I use in my recordings

After experimenting with a few cheap fretless guitars in the late
1980s I became very interested in microtonality and tuning theory,
and since the early 1990s I've gradually abandoned conventionally
tuned string instruments in favor of modest, DIY microtonal ones.
Over the years I've had quite a few of these oddities pass through my
hands for one reason or another, but I still have a small collection
too.

The first guitar I had micro fretted was an Ibanez-like deal with two
humbuckers to 20-tone equal temperament:

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ..ns/P7070193. jpg

This guitar was fretted with banjo wire to help minimize fret
crowding by luthier/banjoist extraordinaire Glenn Nelson :

http://www.mockingb irdmusic. com/

Unlike some tunings, say 24-tone equal temperament which retains the
familiar 12-tone equal temperament, or tunings like 19 or 31-tone
equal temperament which are all but 1/3 and 1/4 comma meantone
tunings, 20-tone equal temperament couldn't be much further from "the
familiar". As a matter-of-fact, it was the dueling pairs of distorted
fifths and maj thirds as well as the inclusion of the exotic Javanese
like 5-tone equal temperament that initially led me to try this
tuning. A curious byproduct of this tuning on a guitar is the unique
ability to tune the open strings exclusively in fourths (at 2/5ths of
an octave) and still retain the traditional EADGBE arrangement- -so in
cents this would be 420, 900, 180, 660, 1140 and back to E at 420
again.

Besides the 20-tone equal temperament electric, I also have a
beautiful 24-tone equal temperament quartertone "Spanish Nail"
Stienberger made by the amazing Chris Shaffer:

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ..onefinished. jpg

I also have two fretless electrics right now. One is a Les Paul with
a zero radius aluminum fingerboard that was made by Rick Canton :

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ..ns/P1140102. jpg

The other fretless is an old Kramer that I originally took the frets
off of planning to refret it to something new. But I ended up playing
it as is, so it's a fretless where the fret slots were never even
filled in--note the colored grease pencil micro markers :

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ../P1010021_ 1.jpg

One other fretless instrument I get a lot of use out of is a three
string fretless baritone ukulele--and depending on the context, this
instrument also neatly doubles as an acoustic fretless piccolo bass:

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ..ns/P7070004. jpg

I also have two other instruments that were customized by Chris
Shaffer. One is a tenor ukulele that I had fretted to a maximally
even 8-out-of-13 subset of 13-tone equal temperament.

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ../P4290289_ 2.jpg

Thirteen-tone equal temperament is almost exclusively mentioned in
tuning theory with a negative connotation- -as a sort of pinnacle of
atonality and discordance. But sometimes things need a different
perspective, and trying to compare 13-tone equal temperament and
common practice tertian harmony is really quite counterproductive.
There are many truly beautiful scales and subsets in 13-tone equal
temperament, and this 8-out-of-13 contains a wonderful 7-tone scale
at 0 2 3 7 8 10 11 13.

The other Shaffer' job was a six string banjo-guitar that retained
the standard 12-tone equal temperament but was augmented with five
additional Just Intonated notes, 33/32, 7/6, 11/8, 14/9 and 7/4:

http://i24.photobuc ket.com/albums/ c33/dans. ..ns/P9170121. jpg

This gives a 17-tone octave, and this arrangement represents three
separate one-dimensional planes of 3, 7 and 11 limit ratios. It also
rather nicely approximates a 3, 5, 7 and 11-limit grid, and the banjo
resonator wonderfully melds these relations in an ambient, organic
haze.

Abandoning tradition in this way is not for everyone of course. Nor
should it be, but for me it was a natural progression of my
interests, so I never really questioned it too much. Over the years
I've come to feel that the beauty is in the work, and that forward
momentum is waking up curious.

http://www.myspace. com/danstearns

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

> I also have two other instruments that were customized by Chris
> Shaffer. One is a tenor ukulele that I had fretted to a maximally
> even 8-out-of-13 subset of 13-tone equal temperament.

Just a quick theory question, which I only ask because I know it's
probably a 1-sentence answer: what does "maximally even" mean?

-Chris Bryan

At 10:32 AM 7/9/2007, you wrote:
>> I also have two other instruments that were customized by Chris
>> Shaffer. One is a tenor ukulele that I had fretted to a maximally
>> even 8-out-of-13 subset of 13-tone equal temperament.
>
>Just a quick theory question, which I only ask because I know it's
>probably a 1-sentence answer: what does "maximally even" mean?
>
>-Chris Bryan

Unfortunately this term is one of a family of similar-sounding
terms which have never been defined very precisely. So your
best bet is to remember it as the general idea that given a
bunch of step sizes (generic 2nds) like {s, L}, maximally even
scales are those that arrange them so the scale is as even
(in the EDO sense) as possible. The major scale is an example
in this case: L L s L L L s. A non-example would be any scale
with the two s's in a row.

-Carl

daniel_anthony_stearns wrote:
> i use the term a little differently, in that maximal evenness favors > palindromic symmetry. So the 7-out-of-12 is "maximally even" at > LsLLLsL and the subset of 13 I used was LsLLsLsL. So in the most > basic, blunt sense, I believe this ME is generalizing diatonicity. > BTW, I embedded the pictures and posted them here :
> > http://negation.hoster905.com/negations/cone/index.php?showtopic=801

Oh boy...

The term maximally even does have a precise definition. Some people may misuse it, but that doesn't make it any less precise. The simplest definition is a mathematical one. There, nth note of the maximally even x from y scale is scale steps

int(n*y/x)

in the "from" scale. That is,

int(n*y/x)/y octaves.

The "int" function can be either floor (truncating down), ceil (like floor but going up) or round to nearest with halves rounding up. Only the starting point changes. It doesn't work with rounding or truncating towards zero or banker's rounding.

Conceptually, it's the nearest you can get to x EDO but tuning to y EDO.

Dan's rounding to nearest here, which is fine. That is a maximally even scale. 7 from 12 is

0, 2, 3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, ...

and 8 from 13 is

0, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15, ...

I think the original definition was using floor instead, but I don't have anything to check (or whether the starting point is part of the definition). But you certainly can't generalize to arbitrary L and s and call the result maximally even. It's only a property of equal temperaments.

I think this all agrees with

http://tonalsoft.com/enc/m/maximal-evenness.aspx

except for Manuel's "more general version".

All of which unfortunately obscures the fact that maximal evenness with its strict definition is a blindingly simple concept.

Graham

> --- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Carl Lumma <ekin@...> wrote:
> >>At 10:32 AM 7/9/2007, you wrote:
>>
>>>> I also have two other instruments that were customized by Chris
>>>> Shaffer. One is a tenor ukulele that I had fretted to a > > maximally
> >>>> even 8-out-of-13 subset of 13-tone equal temperament.
>>>
>>>Just a quick theory question, which I only ask because I know it's
>>>probably a 1-sentence answer: what does "maximally even" mean?
>>>
>>>-Chris Bryan
>>
>>Unfortunately this term is one of a family of similar-sounding
>>terms which have never been defined very precisely. So your
>>best bet is to remember it as the general idea that given a
>>bunch of step sizes (generic 2nds) like {s, L}, maximally even
>>scales are those that arrange them so the scale is as even
>>(in the EDO sense) as possible. The major scale is an example
>>in this case: L L s L L L s. A non-example would be any scale
>>with the two s's in a row.
>>
>>-Carl
>>
> > > >

This is not one of the meanings intended by the person who
coined this term, John Clough.

It does have a Wikipedia entry

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maximal_evenness

The resource for keeping the family members straight is this
excerpt

http://lumma.org/stuff/taxonomy.png

from this paper

Scales, Sets, and Interval Cycles: A Taxonomy
John Clough, Nora Engebretsen, Jonathan Kochavi
Music Theory Spectrum, Vol. 21, No. 1 (Spring, 1999), pp. 74-104

-Carl

At 08:43 PM 7/9/2007, you wrote:
>i use the term a little differently, in that maximal evenness favors
>palindromic symmetry. So the 7-out-of-12 is "maximally even" at
>LsLLLsL and the subset of 13 I used was LsLLsLsL. So in the most
>basic, blunt sense, I believe this ME is generalizing diatonicity.
>BTW, I embedded the pictures and posted them here :
>
>http://negation.hoster905.com/negations/cone/index.php?showtopic=801

At 09:30 PM 7/9/2007, you wrote:
>daniel_anthony_stearns wrote:
>> i use the term a little differently, in that maximal evenness favors
>> palindromic symmetry. So the 7-out-of-12 is "maximally even" at
>> LsLLLsL and the subset of 13 I used was LsLLsLsL. So in the most
>> basic, blunt sense, I believe this ME is generalizing diatonicity.
>> BTW, I embedded the pictures and posted them here :
>>
>> http://negation.hoster905.com/negations/cone/index.php?showtopic=801
>
>Oh boy...
>
>The term maximally even does have a precise definition.

Not really, because Clough changed (or at least clarified his
own words) it after he published the first paper mentioning it.

>Some people may misuse it, but that doesn't make it any less
>precise.

To be fair, how do we know it won't be Dan's version that's
remembered in 100 years? Well, I think from my experience with
these things, Clough's version has enough of a head start to
be respected. But the last time I had this fight with Dan, it
was over EDO, and you can see where that got me.

>The simplest definition is a mathematical one.

We're breaking Chris' "single sentence" piggy bank.

-Carl

I think to be generalized diatonicity, it would have to support existing
diatonic scales. Your definition of ME supports modern dorian mode
(LsLLLsL) and LLsLsLL (which is not a named mode), but none of the other 7
out of 12 modes. OTOH, Carl's definition of ME - not requiring palindromic
symmetry, really is generalized diatonicity, accepting all the usual 7 of
12 modes.

Not sure if either definition accepts scales that change depending on
direction (e.g., melodic minor), but I suppose neither actually excludes
it.

> i use the term a little differently, in that maximal evenness favors
> palindromic symmetry. So the 7-out-of-12 is "maximally even" at
> LsLLLsL and the subset of 13 I used was LsLLsLsL. So in the most
> basic, blunt sense, I believe this ME is generalizing diatonicity.
> BTW, I embedded the pictures and posted them here :
>
> http://negation.hoster905.com/negations/cone/index.php?showtopic=801
>
>
> --- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Carl Lumma <ekin@...> wrote:
>>
>> At 10:32 AM 7/9/2007, you wrote:
>> >> I also have two other instruments that were customized by Chris
>> >> Shaffer. One is a tenor ukulele that I had fretted to a
> maximally
>> >> even 8-out-of-13 subset of 13-tone equal temperament.
>> >
>> >Just a quick theory question, which I only ask because I know it's
>> >probably a 1-sentence answer: what does "maximally even" mean?
>> >
>> >-Chris Bryan
>>
>> Unfortunately this term is one of a family of similar-sounding
>> terms which have never been defined very precisely. So your
>> best bet is to remember it as the general idea that given a
>> bunch of step sizes (generic 2nds) like {s, L}, maximally even
>> scales are those that arrange them so the scale is as even
>> (in the EDO sense) as possible. The major scale is an example
>> in this case: L L s L L L s. A non-example would be any scale
>> with the two s's in a row.
>>
>> -Carl
>>
>
>
>

--
http://DoctorOakroot.com - Rough-edged songs on homemade GIT-tars.

Yikes, I should have known that most simple questions here are capable
of causing riots ;) Still, thanks for the response and apologies for
the thread-hijacking. My reason for asking was because I'm working
with MOS, and wondering what the relationship is to that.

On 10/07/07, Doctor Oakroot <doctor@...> wrote:
>
> I think to be generalized diatonicity, it would have to support existing
> diatonic scales. Your definition of ME supports modern dorian mode
> (LsLLLsL) and LLsLsLL (which is not a named mode), but none of the other 7
> out of 12 modes.

This problem is resolved if you consider all 12 modes to be
permutations of the same scale, which is, I think, a more useful
perspective.

-Chris

At 04:59 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
>I think to be generalized diatonicity, it would have to support existing
>diatonic scales. Your definition of ME supports modern dorian mode
>(LsLLLsL) and LLsLsLL (which is not a named mode),

That's not a mode of the diatonic scale at all. But we're getting
into waters better tread on the tuning list.

-Carl

At 07:51 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
>Yikes, I should have known that most simple questions here are capable
>of causing riots ;) Still, thanks for the response and apologies for
>the thread-hijacking. My reason for asking was because I'm working
>with MOS, and wondering what the relationship is to that.

MOS is another concept for which we don't have a precise definition.
But it's very closely related to the beasts on this table

http://lumma.org/stuff/taxonomy.png

and may be identical to DE (distributionally even).

-Carl

harmonic minor is it not?

Carl Lumma wrote:
>
> At 04:59 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
> >I think to be generalized diatonicity, it would have to support existing
> >diatonic scales. Your definition of ME supports modern dorian mode
> >(LsLLLsL) and LLsLsLL (which is not a named mode),
>
> That's not a mode of the diatonic scale at all. But we're getting
> into waters better tread on the tuning list.
>
> -Carl
>
> -- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/index.html>
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU <http://www.kxlu.com/main/index.asp> 88.9 FM Wed 8-9 pm Los Angeles

On 7/10/07, Kraig Grady <kraiggrady@...> wrote:
> harmonic minor is it not?

No, LLsLsLL is a mode of ascending melodic minor (LsLLLLs).

Keenan

Exactly, that was implied, but i would consider it diatonic. The modes have been used not for over a 100 years now, so i see now reason to consider it an "anomaly".

Keenan Pepper wrote:
>
> On 7/10/07, Kraig Grady <kraiggrady@... > <mailto:kraiggrady%40anaphoria.com>> wrote:
> > harmonic minor is it not?
>
> No, LLsLsLL is a mode of ascending melodic minor (LsLLLLs).
>
> Keenan
>
> -- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/index.html>
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU <http://www.kxlu.com/main/index.asp> 88.9 FM Wed 8-9 pm Los Angeles

According to Wikipedia, I was using the "exclusive" meaning
of the term, while you, Kraig, seem to be a proponent of
the "inclusive" meaning:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatonic

-Carl

At 11:31 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
>Exactly, that was implied, but i would consider it diatonic. The modes
>have been used not for over a 100 years now, so i see now reason to
>consider it an "anomaly".
>
>
>Keenan Pepper wrote:
>>
>> On 7/10/07, Kraig Grady <kraiggrady@...
>> <mailto:kraiggrady%40anaphoria.com>> wrote:
>> > harmonic minor is it not?
>>
>> No, LLsLsLL is a mode of ascending melodic minor (LsLLLLs).
>>
>> Keenan

> At 04:59 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
>>I think to be generalized diatonicity, it would have to support existing
>>diatonic scales. Your definition of ME supports modern dorian mode
>>(LsLLLsL) and LLsLsLL (which is not a named mode),
>
> That's not a mode of the diatonic scale at all. But we're getting
> into waters better tread on the tuning list.
>
> -Carl
>
>
Yes, but it is diatonic mode... just not a mode of the usual diatonic scale.

--
http://DoctorOakroot.com - Rough-edged songs on homemade GIT-tars.

yes i am an inclusive type of guy. they will be used more with time than not i would think

Carl Lemma wrote:
>
> According to Wikipedia, I was using the "exclusive" meaning
> of the term, while you, Kraig, seem to be a proponent of
> the "inclusive" meaning:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatonic > <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diatonic>
>
> -Carl
>
> At 11:31 AM 7/10/2007, you wrote:
> >Exactly, that was implied, but i would consider it diatonic. The modes
> >have been used not for over a 100 years now, so i see now reason to
> >consider it an "anomaly".
> >
> >
> >Keenan Pepper wrote:
> >>
> >> On 7/10/07, Kraig Grady <kraiggrady@... > <mailto:kraiggrady%40anaphoria.com>
> >> <mailto:kraiggrady%40anaphoria.com>> wrote:
> >> > harmonic minor is it not?
> >>
> >> No, LLsLsLL is a mode of ascending melodic minor (LsLLLLs).
> >>
> >> Keenan
>
> -- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/index.html>
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU <http://www.kxlu.com/main/index.asp> 88.9 FM Wed 8-9 pm Los Angeles