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Improvisation before offline time (mp3)

🔗Margo Schulter <mschulter@...>

4/27/2005 6:40:49 PM

Hello, everyone, and I'm posting a curious improvisation prompted by
the remarks from people about "C-G-C#," etc., as a "parting gift" to
everyone before I leave for four weeks to visit my Mom. I should be
back around May 26.

<http://www.microtonal.org/mp3/ZarlinoTESketch01.mp3>

The piece draws on the discussion by Christopher Bailey, Prent Rogers,
Daniel Wolf, and others, which led me to a nonatonic scale with the lowest
tetrachord a Hijaz kind of pattern, with the note names given in a
modified meantone kind of spelling, since that's the kind of system from
which this subset is taken, and with some JI "free associations" suggested
(the 48/25 is actually just, and F-F#/Gb is also a just 25:24):

C# D F F# G G# Bb B C C#
0 121 434 504 625 708 925 1008 1129 1200
~1/1 15/14 9/7 4/3 56/39 3/2 12/7 25/14 48/25 2/1
121 313 71 121 83 217 83 121 71

Anyway, there are two "fifth-plus-tritone-forming-minor-ninth"
sonorities that stood out to me. The Hijaz tetrachord of C#-D-F-F#
gives a natural occasion for using something like C#-G#-D in a
drone-supported style, about 0-708-1321 cents, or in a JI
interpretation something like 14:21:30. The outer interval is quite
close to 7:15, but the fifth is wide, so the tritone is a bit narrower
than 7:10 (around 613 cents rather than 617 cents).

The other sonority of this kind that I found myself immediately drawn
to is C-G-C#, about 0-696-1271 cents, something like 12:18:25 (the
12:25 is indeed just). However, because the fifth here is a usual
narrow meantone fifth, the tritone at about 575 cents is about midway
between 25:18 (about 569 cents) and the larger 7:5 (about 583 cents).

For those who might be curious, here's the nonatonic scale:

! zartehijaz1.scl
!
Scale from Zarlino temperament extraordinaire -- lower Hijaz tetrachord
9
!
120.94826
433.51722
504.18965
625.13792
708.37930
925.13792
1008.37930
1129.32757
2/1

and here's the complete modified meantone circle from which these nine
notes are drawn:

! zarte84a.scl
!
Temperament extraordinaire, F-C# Zarlino's 2/7-comma, other 5ths equally wide
12
!
25/24
191.62069
287.43104
383.24139
504.18965
574.86208
695.81035
779.05173
887.43104
995.81035
1079.05173
2/1

Peace and love, with best wishes to all,

Margo

🔗Christopher Bailey <chris@...>

5/1/2005 7:28:22 AM

A very lovely and subtle scale.

>
>
>
> From: Margo Schulter <mschulter@...>
>Subject: Improvisation before offline time (mp3)
>
>Hello, everyone, and I'm posting a curious improvisation prompted by
>the remarks from people about "C-G-C#," etc., as a "parting gift" to
>everyone before I leave for four weeks to visit my Mom. I should be
>back around May 26.
>
> <http://www.microtonal.org/mp3/ZarlinoTESketch01.mp3>

C# D F F# G G# Bb B C C#
0 121 434 504 625 708 925 1008 1129 1200
~1/1 15/14 9/7 4/3 56/39 3/2 12/7 25/14 48/25 2/1
121 313 71 121 83 217 83 121 71

Anyway, there are two "fifth-plus-tritone-forming-minor-ninth"
sonorities that stood out to me. The Hijaz tetrachord of C#-D-F-F#
gives a natural occasion for using something like C#-G#-D in a
drone-supported style, about 0-708-1321 cents, or in a JI
interpretation something like 14:21:30. The outer interval is quite
close to 7:15, but the fifth is wide, so the tritone is a bit narrower
than 7:10 (around 613 cents rather than 617 cents).