My 14 tone equal temperament compositions

These pieces were composed about 20 years ago but for many
years they sat on a cassette tape without anyone listening to them
(some people might argue that's where they should have stayed!)
Anyway, I felt I put in a good deal of time and energy on those
pieces, and since that tape did not have a backup I was afraid that
the tape might one day get eaten up by some tape recorder and would
be gone forever. So I decided to upload the pieces onto mp3.com a
few years ago to store the pieces in a place I thought would be safe
(so much for that theory) and where somebody could hear them if they
were interested in such things.
To be honest, the reason I decided to try 14 tone equal
temperament was by a miscalculation of mine. Originally I wanted to
include perfect fifths in my pieces by spliting the interval into
eight instead of seven equal parts. Later I saw that this caused the
octave to be out of tune, but instead of totally giving up on the
idea (which maybe I should have at the time) I went with what I
thought was a viable alternative.
Perhaps I am showing my ignorance regarding the pros and cons
of the various micotonal equal temperaments (or maybe my ears are
simply not screwed on right) but while I was composing these pieces I
did not get a sense that the tuning was dissonant and that it should
therefore be abandoned. I simply went for it. I took the tools I
had to work with and did the best that my ears told me I could with
that temperament. I appreciate any dialogue (either good or bad)
that these pieces might generate; for me any dialogue is better that
having my pieces stay on that cassete tape collecting dust.

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "terriandralph"
<terriandralph@a...> wrote:

> These pieces were composed about 20 years ago but for many
> years they sat on a cassette tape without anyone listening to them
> (some people might argue that's where they should have stayed!)

Not me; I'm all for expanding the available store of microtonal
music. I assumed these were of more recent vintage and I had in mind
interesting you with possibilites I personally like better, but of
course anyone may (and if they like it, should) use the tuning system
of their choice.

--- terriandralph <terriandralph@...> wrote:
> These pieces were composed about 20 years ago but for many
> years they sat on a cassette tape without anyone listening to them
> (some people might argue that's where they should have stayed!)

I wouldn't argue that. I enjoyed them quite a bit.

> To be honest, the reason I decided to try 14 tone equal
> temperament was by a miscalculation of mine. Originally I wanted to
> include perfect fifths in my pieces by spliting the interval into
> eight instead of seven equal parts. Later I saw that this caused the
> octave to be out of tune, but instead of totally giving up on the
> idea (which maybe I should have at the time) I went with what I
> thought was a viable alternative.

Had you split the perfect fifth into eight, you would have arrived at a
nonoctave tuning. It complicates things, but in fact, writing in a tuning
without octaves is quite doable. In fact, some people favor nonoctave
tunings. (see http://www.nonoctave.com)

> Perhaps I am showing my ignorance regarding the pros and cons
> of the various micotonal equal temperaments (or maybe my ears are
> simply not screwed on right) but while I was composing these pieces I
> did not get a sense that the tuning was dissonant and that it should
> therefore be abandoned. I simply went for it. I took the tools I
> had to work with and did the best that my ears told me I could with
> that temperament.

Personally, I think that's awesome. The music you came up with is sincere
and organic. In my opinion, if the tuning doesn't represent some idyllic
relationship with JI, who cares? It is a unique tuning, and you embraced it
with sincerity. No apology necessary!

-Andrew

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