the MMM/Tuning List distinction.

Hey,

If no one else feels the way I do about this, I'll shut up and let nature take
it's course.

I'm getting a little disturbed, however, that the Tuning List vibe of
math/theory issues is becoming the prevalent 'gestalt' even over here on MMM,
where I used to love to come for a breath of non-technical fresh air,
right-brained intuitive thinking, sharing of works, aesthetics, etc. Now, it
seems like there is no difference (that I can tell) between MMM and the old
tuning list. It only took a week.

Now, I bring up the old conundrum--theory vs. practice, and why we can't
incorporate both into one list, etc. Let me be brief and say that the math
has always dominated the Tuning List, and MMM was a nice place to come to get
that 'tempered' by aesthetic, compositional, and hardware/software concerns.

I don't know the answer here folks. Just thought I'd risk raising my alarm and
see if anyone else felt the same.

I'd almost propose the insane (or is it--it might be a wonderful change)
solution of a composition-only list (I thought MMM would be that candidate),
a theory-only list, and a hardware/software discussion list.

What I'd like to see is people discussing actual microtonal works, and theory
in that case would only be relevant where it concerned the work(s) under
discussion. Any general discussions of microtonal aesthetics would also be
considered relevant. Again, I admit a problem with drawing the line, but I
woud say as soon as the terminology of 'ennalimmeal', 'monzos' and 'vals'
pops up on MMM, I feel MMM is no longer MMM.

For instance, a subject thread might be Kyle Gann's 'Custer's Ghost' and it's
use of 'just dissonance', and how he used that resource in that particular
work, etc., and the effect of that on the listener.

For now let me say that I don't take much interest in many of the recent
trends and threads of MMM, which are indistinguishable from the standard
tuning list. I think those topics are fine and interesting to some, but
should stay over there, IMO, where they are more on topic, and not here,
where they are much less so.

Something funny is happening to the community--an internal rupture of some
sort. Carl leaving; Jon saying he won't post anything but announcements;
flaming and ego battles; -- all these things are making a lot of people who
should be friends very bitter (it seems) at each other. It's sad--the tuning
community right before Peter Wakefield Sault was at a nice point, right after
he came and left, he left a nasty tone and division in his wake, it seems.
And now McLaren has stirred up a nasty vibe at metatuning as well. At least
that's how I recall the history of how I've felt about the community.

Now I'll duck under a boulder while the bullets fly at me and across me, and
the 'camps' split into two or three. (It would be great to see a potentially
sensitive post receive a measured response where this didn't happen !!!!
Let's try it...)

Best,
Aaron Krister Johnson
http://www.dividebypi.com
http://www.akjmusic.com

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Aaron K. Johnson"
<akjmicro@c...> wrote:

I'm following this up on metatuning, where I think the thread belongs.

Aaron K. Johnson wrote:

>Hey,
> >
What Aaron said. Yep.

--
* David Beardsley
* microtonal guitar
* http://biink.com/db

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Aaron K. Johnson"
<akjmicro@c...> wrote:

> Again, I admit a problem with drawing the line, but I
> woud say as soon as the terminology of 'ennalimmeal', 'monzos'
and 'vals'
> pops up on MMM, I feel MMM is no longer MMM.

Aaron, I agree with virtually everything you wrote in this post, and
the traffic is low enough on the tuning list to easily accomodate all
this stuff. I strongly encourage moving it all there, and I've begun
doing that myself.

However, I have a small point of contention on the above. Recently,
the word 'ennealimmal' came up on this list, but it was in connection
with *actual music*, and not at all with *theory*. (The theory behind
this tuning system has of course been discussed on other lists.) Is
it too theoretical-sounding a word? Is 'meantone'? They're just
words. People attach all kinds of silly words to their scales and
their music and no one complains -- nor should they. We are all
gentle people, so feelings get easily hurt, lead to flamewars, etc.
Be a little careful -- that's all I can ask.

On Thursday 29 April 2004 06:58 pm, Paul Erlich wrote:
> --- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Aaron K. Johnson"
>
> <akjmicro@c...> wrote:
> > Again, I admit a problem with drawing the line, but I
> > woud say as soon as the terminology of 'ennalimmeal', 'monzos'
>
> and 'vals'
>
> > pops up on MMM, I feel MMM is no longer MMM.
>
> Aaron, I agree with virtually everything you wrote in this post, and
> the traffic is low enough on the tuning list to easily accomodate all
> this stuff. I strongly encourage moving it all there, and I've begun
> doing that myself.
>
> However, I have a small point of contention on the above. Recently,
> the word 'ennealimmal' came up on this list, but it was in connection
> with *actual music*, and not at all with *theory*. (The theory behind
> this tuning system has of course been discussed on other lists.) Is
> it too theoretical-sounding a word? Is 'meantone'? They're just
> words. People attach all kinds of silly words to their scales and
> their music and no one complains -- nor should they. We are all
> gentle people, so feelings get easily hurt, lead to flamewars, etc.
> Be a little careful -- that's all I can ask

Point taken, and I don't mean to offend anyone....all *I* personally would
want is that any theoretical scale talk on MMM be in reference to *actual
created works*, or at least MIDI/mp3 examples or what have you, clearly
linked.

In a word--*audible* sounds. Anything else, and I'm afraid we've lost 'Music'.
Please, let's not make this group 'Make Microtonal Math'. If that happens,
I'm afraid McLaren's (otherwise rampantly trolling and 'ad hominem') rants
have a point.

As for 'ennealimmeal'--for me, its a *bit* much, but that's personal. For
some, 'meantone' means nothing, as you suggest. I guess the only way to know
is to take a general consensus of the list subscribers as to what is a bit
too theoretical or math-centric. I know I'm not alone in thinking that MMM
has gone a bit too much the way of ATL *already*, however.

Far too little talk on aesthetics is done here, while we're at it. Concert and
CD reviews, educational discussions of essential recordings and microtonal
repertoire, discussions of compositional technique (duh!!!), how form,
rhythm, and affect might be effected by the technical choice of scale, etc.

At least to me and many others, this is where the meat of the discussion
*ought* be, and I long for a group where this is reality !!!

That being said, no thread is ever going to be interesting to all members
equally, or even applicable (Mac OS-X threads mean nothing to a Linux geek
like me). But there are certainly on topic according to Jon's published
guidlines....

Best,
Aaron Krister Johnson
http://www.dividebypi.com
http://www.akjmusic.com

>
> Far too little talk on aesthetics is done here, while we're at it. Concert and
> CD reviews, educational discussions of essential recordings and microtonal
> repertoire, discussions of compositional technique (duh!!!), how form,
> rhythm, and affect might be effected by the technical choice of scale, etc.
>

Let's Get Cracking: I'm particularly seduced by 15-equal at the moment. Questions I
really would love to ask:
1) What 15-equal pieces are there, which have you heard, which do you like and why?
Which would in fact be "essential"? We can follow this up with discussions of
compositional technique in such pieces.

2) What are your successes/failures in getting average musicians to hear and play the
intervals found within 15 (which I find myself categorizing as [1/1 16/15 12/11 8/
7 6/5 5/4 21/16 11/8] plus their octave-inversions)? How do they react to the
absence of anything resembling a whole tone?

3) What, from your experience, is 15 *good* at? How does it affect form, rhythm,
affect? (This is, of course, the only thing that people mean by the "mood" of a scale.)

> At least to me and many others, this is where the meat of the discussion
> *ought* be, and I long for a group where this is reality !!!

Amen.

> Best,

Jacob

On Thursday 29 April 2004 11:06 pm, Jacob wrote:
> > Far too little talk on aesthetics is done here, while we're at it.
> > Concert and CD reviews, educational discussions of essential recordings
> > and microtonal repertoire, discussions of compositional technique
> > (duh!!!), how form, rhythm, and affect might be effected by the technical
> > choice of scale, etc.
>
> Let's Get Cracking: I'm particularly seduced by 15-equal at the moment.
> Questions I really would love to ask:
> 1) What 15-equal pieces are there, which have you heard, which do you like
> and why? Which would in fact be "essential"? We can follow this up with
> discussions of compositional technique in such pieces.

I'm very inexperienced and unknowledgeable about any corpus of 15-tet works. I
know Blackwood has some guitar music, etc.

I confess I was unimpressed with it at the time.....I tend to like JI or JI
like temperaments best, but have heard stunning stuff in tunings that had
nothing to do with approximating JI. 15-tet, to me, strikes me as
uninteresting *precisely* because it's in the middle of those worlds (maybe
that's why it's interesting--like the math professor asking 'what's the first
uninteresting number', which makes it interesting--thus there are no
uninteresting numbers (or tunings))

Maybe *you* could lead this particular 15-tet discussion? Tell us what turns
*you* on and why....pump some passion into these discussion!

> 2) What are your successes/failures in getting average musicians to hear
> and play the intervals found within 15 (which I find myself categorizing as
> [1/1 16/15 12/11 8/ 7 6/5 5/4 21/16 11/8] plus their octave-inversions)?
> How do they react to the absence of anything resembling a whole tone?

Geez, I never talk microtonality with any fellow musicians (except my 'Divide
by Pi' partner, Andy) in the real world--mostly cyberspace. So I never tested
anyone with 15-tet. Mostly because I never used it myself. It wasn't the
first tuning to jump out at me of all the N-tets. or JI schemes

> 3) What, from your experience, is 15 *good* at? How does it affect form,
> rhythm, affect? (This is, of course, the only thing that people mean by the
> "mood" of a scale.)

Jacob, let me hold up a mirror (I like this discussion). Since you are seduced
by 15-tet, start out by telling us why you are....do you have any mp3/MIDI
examples, if not compositions, you would share with us to relate particular
instances that illustrated your seduction?

Best,
--
Aaron Krister Johnson
http://www.dividebypi.com
http://www.akjmusic.com

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Jacob" <jbarton@r...> wrote:
>
> >
> > Far too little talk on aesthetics is done here, while we're at
it. Concert and
> > CD reviews, educational discussions of essential recordings and
microtonal
> > repertoire, discussions of compositional technique (duh!!!), how
form,
> > rhythm, and affect might be effected by the technical choice of
scale, etc.
> >
>
> Let's Get Cracking: I'm particularly seduced by 15-equal at the
moment.

Awesome! My last making microtonal music session, on Tuesday, was
entirely focused on 15-equal. It's easy on the Korg Karma: just set
the "pitch slope" on the oscillators to 0.8.

> Questions I
> really would love to ask:
> 1) What 15-equal pieces are there, which have you heard, which do
>you like and why?

There's a lot of stuff. Out of Blackwood's, I like the electronic
etude more than the guitar suite, but the open strings in the latter
form the juicy 5-equal pentad. I've enjoyed Herman Miller's "Mizarian
Porcupine Overture" in several versions, and that's in 15-equal.
Randy Winchester did something nice with it, as did other tuning list
people I can't recall at the moment. I haven't heard Clem Fortuna's
music yet, but I hope to.

> Which would in fact be "essential"?

I plan to create some :)

> 2) What are your successes/failures in getting average musicians to
hear and play the
> intervals found within 15 (which I find myself categorizing as [1/1
16/15 12/11 8/
> 7 6/5 5/4 21/16 11/8] plus their octave-inversions)?

I think different intervals can be heard in different ways, depending
on context. So I don't think such a 'rationalization' is useful at
all -- particularly intervals as complex as 21/16. For example, the 3-
step interval is close to 8/7, but can even be easily heard as a
functional 7/6 in some contexts -- such as the music we were making
on Tuesday. I'd be happy to go a lot further on this on the tuning
list, if you ask.

> How do they react to the
> absence of anything resembling a whole tone?

You don't want to try anything too diatonic-scaley in 15 -- this is
one of the major failings of Blackwood's guitar suite, in my opinion.
Either keep the modulations flowing faster than the scale can
complete itself, or use other scales -- I especially like
the 'porcupine' scales (3 2 2 2 2 2 2 and 2 2 2 3 2 2 2 -- also try
replacing the '3' with 2+1 or 1+2) and the 'blackwood' scale (2 1 2 1
2 1 2 1 2 1, variations possible). These are rich in triads and make
for nice smooth alien melodies . . . they also have unique chord
progressions and modulations that can't be done in 12-equal . . .

> 3) What, from your experience, is 15 *good* at? How does it
>affect form, rhythm,
> affect? (This is, of course, the only thing that people mean by
>the "mood" of a scale.)

15 keeps you moving fast, since most of the intervals are pretty far
from JI, and sitting on them can be "painful". Notable exceptions are
the 4- and 11-step intervals (which are great approximations of 6:5
and 5:3).