More new microtonal music

When it rains, it pours! On the heals of Daniel Stearns Ives
commemoration in "Over the Rivers" at
http://zebox.com/daniel_anthony_stearns/, and Jeff Harringtons new
realizations of his Piano Preludes at http://parnasse.com/mp3/?M=D
we have a plethora of new music to listen to and enjoy. Is this a
great time or what!

To add a bit more to this mix, I've uploaded a new piece to SoundClick
at http://www.soundclick.com/PrentRodgers called Dry Hole Canyon for
Woodwind Quintet. This is the result of some work over the last few
months to explore the 15-limit tonality diamond. It's another in my
"Fake but Accurate" music made with Csound and the McGill University
Master Samples. I've tried to keep the woodwind quintet sonorities,
but apply them to minor and subminor modes of the tonality diamond.
More details of the tonality is up on my web site at
http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net . Mouse over Liner Notes to Dry
Hole Canyon to read about the scales and techniques. Lots of notes.

The reference to "Fake but Accurate" is from a NY Times headline from
9/15/04 about the Dan Rather/Jerry Killian/Texas Air National Guard
memos that were created on a computer in Microsoft Word, but were
supposed to have been made on a 1970's typewritter. The Times reporter
said the memos appeared to be forgeries, but they were accurate
anyway. All the news that's fake but accurate! I like to think of the
combination of Csound and samples is similar to a photoshop forgery
for sound. Imagine a woodwind quintet with tanks of helium, and you
get an idea of my latest piece.

Prent Rodgers

Web page: http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net
Blog: http://www.xanga.com/music1024
Music: http://www.soundclick.com/PrentRodgers

On Friday 15 October 2004 05:47 pm, Prent Rodgers wrote:

> To add a bit more to this mix, I've uploaded a new piece to SoundClick
> at http://www.soundclick.com/PrentRodgers called Dry Hole Canyon for
> Woodwind Quintet. This is the result of some work over the last few
> months to explore the 15-limit tonality diamond. It's another in my
> "Fake but Accurate" music made with Csound and the McGill University
> Master Samples.

Prent, you are a true original. Score for yourself another winning piece !!!
This was so thouroughly *you*, and a joy to listen to.

I'd love to see you move in a direction, compositionally speaking, where the
surface indeterminacy remains, but there is a clear sense of large scale
directional structure based on something other than cyclical chord
progressions. More evidence of a guiding intelligence. OTOH, I rather like
the sense of 'antiseptic icy cool stasis' that your music evokes for me,
because it is like a fantastic alien automated machine! So perhaps you could
have both if you work with one on one level, and another way on a larger
level. I suppose you do something of this in reverse by having pre-determined
phrases that are randomly chosen....But it would be interesting to see what
might happen if you did a different large-scale architecture. One direction
might be to do a little suite of works, around the one minute mark or so,
that chain together, forming an 8-10 minute larger work, but each one has a
contrasting tempo, affect, etc.

Loved it as always! ;)

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

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Prent Rodgers"
<prentrodgers@c...> wrote:
>
> To add a bit more to this mix, I've uploaded a new piece to SoundClick
> at http://www.soundclick.com/PrentRodgers called Dry Hole Canyon for
> Woodwind Quintet. This is the result of some work over the last few
> months to explore the 15-limit tonality diamond. It's another in my
> "Fake but Accurate" music made with Csound and the McGill University
> Master Samples. I've tried to keep the woodwind quintet sonorities,
> but apply them to minor and subminor modes of the tonality diamond.
> More details of the tonality is up on my web site at
> http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net . Mouse over Liner Notes to Dry
> Hole Canyon to read about the scales and techniques. Lots of notes.
>
> The reference to "Fake but Accurate" is from a NY Times headline from
> 9/15/04 about the Dan Rather/Jerry Killian/Texas Air National Guard
> memos that were created on a computer in Microsoft Word, but were
> supposed to have been made on a 1970's typewritter. The Times reporter
> said the memos appeared to be forgeries, but they were accurate
> anyway. All the news that's fake but accurate! I like to think of the
> combination of Csound and samples is similar to a photoshop forgery
> for sound. Imagine a woodwind quintet with tanks of helium, and you
> get an idea of my latest piece.
>

Very very cool piece! Amazing what YOU can get out of Csound. Loved
all the glissandi, seemed like a logical extension of that piano piece
Rhapsody? Would you consider posting your CSD's sometime or
explaining your workflow process? I see you've got your own macro
language from visiting your site.

jeff

> To add a bit more to this mix, I've uploaded a new piece to SoundClick
> at http://www.soundclick.com/PrentRodgers called Dry Hole Canyon for
> Woodwind Quintet. This is the result of some work over the last few
> months to explore the 15-limit tonality diamond. It's another in my
> "Fake but Accurate" music made with Csound and the McGill University
> Master Samples.

Wow, the 10min/day is really paying off. This seems to have a lot more
subtlety as far as the performance than your earlier work.

[Aaron wrote...]
>I'd love to see you move in a direction, compositionally speaking, where
>the surface indeterminacy remains, but there is a clear sense of large
>scale directional structure based on something other than cyclical chord
>progressions.

Seconded, though I do like the playful nature of the compositions as
they are.

-Carl

Jeff,

Thanks for the good word. The source code is on the liner notes page
on my web site at http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net or directly at
http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net/listen/DRYHOL6.CSD and
http://prodgers13.home.comcast.net/listen/dryhol6.txt for the
preprocessor source code with note names.

The piano piece was called Resolution in Blue.

I create the pieces using the macro language, which generates Csound
input. Notes have names, like &B7/4., &G3/2., and &B11/6. and these
are translated in to numbers, which Csound indexes to tables of
fractional values, which then become frequencies. Each note gets its
own duration, glissando, volume, start time, envelope, stereo value,
note and octave. Each sample based instrument plays notes. Csound
automatically generates a new instrument if they overlap. The
preprocessor allows any number of indirections. By this I mean you can
create a macro of a note, and another macro of that macro combined
with another, and another, to any number of offsets. For example, the
indication:

&al-g16/11maj1d.

refers to a macro defined as

.al-g16/11maj1d &flu.&bas-g16/11maj1a*. &obo.&bas-g16/11maj1a*.
&cla.&bas-g16/11maj1a*. &frn.o-1&bas-g16/11maj1a*.
&bas.&bas-g16/11maj1a*.

In turn, &bas-g16/11maj1a*. was previously defined as any of the
following choices:

.bas-g16/11maj1a1 d84v-3&g16/11. d6&b20/11. d6
.bas-g16/11maj1a2 &basran.d18h8e8&basran.&g16/11maj-3u-a*.d12
d18o-1&g16/11maj-3u-b*.d12
.bas-g16/11maj1a3 &basran.d12h8e8&basran.&g16/11maj-3u-a*.d24
d12o-1&g16/11maj-3u-b*.d24
.bas-g16/11maj1a4 d24r0 &basran.d12h8e8&basran.&g16/11maj-3u-a*.
o-1&g16/11maj-3u-b*.
.bas-g16/11maj1a5 d24r0 &basran.d6h8e8&basran.&g16/11maj-3u-a*.d24
d6o-1&g16/11maj-3u-b*.d24
.bas-g16/11maj1a6 d90h72&basran.u2v-3&f14/11.&glv8:7. d6g0h0
.bas-g16/11maj1a7 d0h0r0u1v-3&g16/11maj-3gu-b*.d90&basran.h72
o-2u0d0r0&g16/11maj-3u-a*.d6g0h0&basran.
.bas-g16/11maj1a8 d0h0r0u255v-3&g16/11maj-3gd-b*.d90&basran.h72
o-2u0d0r0&g16/11maj-3u-a*.d6g0h0&basran.

Durations are d values, how long until the next note. Values of h are
how long to hold a note. If h is less than d, then you have a
staccatto. If more, you have legato. Envelopes are a set of e values,
pointing to function tables that might include crescendo or
decrescendo, sharp or smooth envelopes. Octaves are o values. Upsample
values are u numbers, which artifically choose a sample higher or
lower than normal to increase or decrease munchkinization. Glissandi
are g values, which again point to Csound function tables which might
be no slide (g0) or any of a number of carefully calculated slide
amounts and shapes. Randomization within a macro is dictated by r
values, r0 = don't play, r16 always, r in between is up the the
preprocessor to decide. The predominant indeterminacy is choosing
which macro to invoke. If a macro is called with an asterisk in the
last position, any macro that satisfies the name up to the asterisk is
fair game.

Prent Rodgers
--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "idealordid" <jeff@p...> wrote:
> Loved
> all the glissandi, seemed like a logical extension of that piano
piece
> Rhapsody? Would you consider posting your CSD's sometime or
> explaining your workflow process? I see you've got your own macro
> language from visiting your site.
>
> jeff

Carl, Aaron,
Thanks for listening. I appreciate your input. Movement has always
been a challenge for me. I'll have to really think about ways to keep
from having too monochromatic a voice in the pieces. Large directional
structure is the operative criticism, and I accept that.

Prent Rodgers

>
> [Aaron wrote...]
> >I'd love to see you move in a direction, compositionally speaking,
where
> >the surface indeterminacy remains, but there is a clear sense of
large
> >scale directional structure based on something other than cyclical
chord
> >progressions.
>
> Seconded, though I do like the playful nature of the compositions as
> they are.
>
> -Carl

I think in this case what's ommitted is an important part of the
charecter of the music,so I see this as a strength here

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "Aaron K. Johnson"
<akjmicro@c...> wrote:
> On Friday 15 October 2004 05:47 pm, Prent Rodgers wrote:
>
> > To add a bit more to this mix, I've uploaded a new piece to
SoundClick
> > at http://www.soundclick.com/PrentRodgers called Dry Hole Canyon
for
> > Woodwind Quintet. This is the result of some work over the last
few
> > months to explore the 15-limit tonality diamond. It's another in
my
> > "Fake but Accurate" music made with Csound and the McGill
University
> > Master Samples.
>
> Prent, you are a true original. Score for yourself another winning
piece !!!
> This was so thouroughly *you*, and a joy to listen to.
>
> I'd love to see you move in a direction, compositionally speaking,
where the
> surface indeterminacy remains, but there is a clear sense of large
scale
> directional structure based on something other than cyclical chord
> progressions. More evidence of a guiding intelligence. OTOH, I
rather like
> the sense of 'antiseptic icy cool stasis' that your music evokes
for me,
> because it is like a fantastic alien automated machine! So perhaps
you could
> have both if you work with one on one level, and another way on a
larger
> level. I suppose you do something of this in reverse by having pre-
determined
> phrases that are randomly chosen....But it would be interesting to
see what
> might happen if you did a different large-scale architecture. One
direction
> might be to do a little suite of works, around the one minute mark
or so,
> that chain together, forming an 8-10 minute larger work, but each
one has a
> contrasting tempo, affect, etc.
>
> Loved it as always! ;)
>
> Cheers,
> Aaron Krister Johnson
> http://www.akjmusic.com
> http://www.dividebypi.com