Taking in _Over the Rivers_ by Dan Stearns

Hello, everyone, and I'd be curious if others have had the opportunity of
enjoying _Over the Rivers_ by Dan Stearms:

<http://zebox.com/daniel_anthony_stearns/>

This exciting piece, as you've discussed, Dan, in an earlier post, is in
11-EDO, and more specifically in a very interesting scale which we've both
found has some melodic qualities rather like that of a seven-note diatonic
style -- although here the structure is hexatonic:

0 2 4 6 8 9 11
0 218 436 655 873 982 1200

Anyway, it's quite a piece to "take in" -- to borrow the title of your
discussion on the Tuning List a few years back about "Taking in the Phi
Trail" or the like.

It's a very active contrapuntal texture, with rich layering, lots of
percussive sounds, and some melodic lines which indeed show the "lyric"
qualities of this scale, as I might call them. At the same down, there's a
certain "down home" Dan Stearns quality that makes this sound maybe a bit
more "gritty" -- or maybe "Dionysian" -- than some of the pieces of Bill
Sethares which likewise show a masterful use of timbres to achieve
xentonal tours de force. There's a certain creative abandon that lends a
note of excitement, the kind of effect you might get with a group of
musicians gathering for a feast and joyfully mixing practiced technique,
convivial enthusiasm, and a bit of measured chaos.

Anyway, there was a special lesson for me in this 11-EDO piece: the same
scale can be used in various styles, each with its own attractions. Thus
Dan's piece might be contrasted with my recent improvisation in the same
11-EDO scale, _Rhapsody for Dan Stearns_:

<http://www.bestii.com/~mschulter/RhapsodyForDanStearns1.mp3>

Here the idea is to use a timbre in which the 11-EDO "fifth" of 6 steps or
about 655 cents can serve as a consonance somewhat like a fifth closer to
a ratio of 3:2 (about 702 cents), and provide a goal or "resolution" for
progressions with two or more voices involving other intervals as
relatively more "unstable."

These pieces raise a more general question: Does a given tuning system
have a distinct ethos or "character" -- for example, the "bias toward
harmony" or "bias toward melody" suggested for different equal
temperaments by Ivor Darreg -- or is such "character" more a reflection of
how a given musician approaches the intonational environment of a given
system?

Anyway, Dan, thanks so much for calling _Over the Rivers" to my attention:
I'd urge everyone to give it a listen, and be curious about how other
people respond to this enjoyably and exuberantly crafted xentonal
masterpiece.

Most appreciatively,

Margo Schulter
mschulter@...

>Hello, everyone, and I'd be curious if others have had the
>opportunity of enjoying _Over the Rivers_ by Dan Stearms:
>
><http://zebox.com/daniel_anthony_stearns/>

I tried to get to this the other day, but I couldn't reach
zebox.com. But it's back up now. This is a great piece.
Pure Dan Stearns, yet somehow different than most of the
stuff I have from you, Dan. More synth?

-Carl

At 11:28 AM 4/20/2005, I wrote:
>
>>Hello, everyone, and I'd be curious if others have had the
>>opportunity of enjoying _Over the Rivers_ by Dan Stearms:
>>
>><http://zebox.com/daniel_anthony_stearns/>
>
>I tried to get to this the other day, but I couldn't reach
>zebox.com. But it's back up now. This is a great piece.
>Pure Dan Stearns, yet somehow different than most of the
>stuff I have from you, Dan. More synth?
>
>-Carl

My memory is officially defunct -- I already had this on
my hard drive! I'm glad I 'tasted it again for the first
time' though!

-Carl

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, "daniel_anthony_stearns"
<daniel_anthony_stearns@...> wrote:
>
> thought i'd bump this up with recent 11 discussion.

If it is possible to set up Zbox without the embedded flash player
stuff, I'd do it and save people the aggrivation.

> > thought i'd bump this up with recent 11 discussion.
>
> If it is possible to set up Zbox without the embedded flash player
> stuff, I'd do it and save people the aggrivation.

Huh; I've never seen an embedded player on this site.

-Carl

C/G,

{you wrote...}
>Huh; I've never seen an embedded player on this site.

yeah, new to me to. But the player (Wimpy) is used all over, and is a fine use of another technology to stream audio. And you can still download the file if you want. I actually like having a player sometimes, as I can sample a short bit and see if I even want the file to come down to my machine.

Cheers,
Jon (who is going back to download the file so I can say something to Dan after listening other than widget babble...)