Fitting microtonal music into established sub-genres of popular music is not a bad thing IMO...

I'm very new here - and I certainly don't claim to have extensive knowledge
about the theory of micro-tonal music.  I do, however, feel qualified to at
least say this much...

The mere fact that a piece of microtonal music fits (more or less) within one of
the rapidly proliferating subgenres of popular music does not make it a failure
in my mind.  

If I am of the opinion that a composition "doesn't stand out" as somewhat unique
when directly compared and contrasted with the majority of other compositions
within it's own particular subgenre, I certainly see how that can be interpreted
as an indication of relative weakness of that composition.  Even so, it does NOT
mean that I should dismiss the composition entirely.  It may contain
some potential for further development.  Or it may be very effective for a
purpose that does not require it to "stand out" as unique amongst its
contemporaries.  After all, as great as it is to be outstanding, "standing out"
is not the singular measure by which all compositions live or die, is it?

I apologize if all of this has been discussed ad nauseum before.  Once again, I
am new here.  But I also think it is only fair that we make an attempt to
delineate our appraisal of microtonal compositions from our appraisals of it's
performance and production.  Although I concede that top-notch performance and
production (and marketing for that matter) are pragmatic concerns for
anyone seriously striving to ingratiate microtones to a general public in
tune with (if not entirely engulfed by and indoctrinated in) 12 tone, diatonic
music.  But I think the best approach in this regard, however, would be to enjoy
listening to and creating music and then letting the larger forces of music
history work itself out as we go. 

Better yet, perhaps the ideal would be for those few among us who consider
ourselves as being particularly strong in terms of performance and production to
"team up" with a few of the most inspired and effective composers toward the
goal of creating something semi-marketable within avant, experimental, or
progressive rock niches.  Then those of us with marketing and promotion skills
to contribute toward packaging and promoting such a product. 

--- In MakeMicroMusic@ yahoogroups. com, Michael <djtrancendance@ ...> wrote:

> Well, a question about my own failure, what "genre" does my piece pigeonhole
>itself in? I suppose I failed at my goal, which was to write something with a
>dance-like energy, new age like softness, jazz-style solos, and ambient-like
>textures that really can't be pigeonholed in a genre.  Maybe I should have gone
>even further and thrown in some surprise harsh sounds to make it more obvious
>it's not easy listening?.. ..

I think you did quite well if you were trying for "dance-like energy, new age
like softness, jazz-style solos". Since there are hundreds of genres of popular
music I couldn't possibly say it wasn't like any of them, however. I'm pretty
certain that my entry didn't fall into any recognizable genre, but if Hans
thinks it does I would, like you, be interested to hear what pigeon he thinks
inhabits that particular hole.

 Mark Stephens
ProgPositivity - The Best Prog and Fusion - Positively!
http://www.progpositivity.com

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