TUNING digest 952

PAULE wrote:

> Matt Nathan wrote,
>
> >I think rather the idea of a "scale" as a
> >limiter
> >of pitch choices is the problem.
>
> It's a feature, not a bug.
> (I hate that expression!)

hehe

> Harmony is a recent development in music;

I can except that.

> a fixed set of pitches has proved
> an extremely valuable basis for organizing compositions and improvisations
> for much longer.

Hm, I don't know if I'm willing to accept that. I'm not an historian like
some participants on this list, but I doubt that a strong case could be
made for proving that back in the beginnings of human melody, the pitch set
determined the melodic choices rather than the other way around. You know
what I mean? I suspect that conceptions of fixed pitch sets are tied more
with the practicalities of instrument making than pure melodic thought. I
will not deny that "choosing pitches from a set" is now a popular method
for generating melody. I wish to move away from that and free melody (again?)
from the restrictions of pre-determined pitch sets. If you could sing, or
play any pitch on demand, what melodic inspiration might be enabled by this?
Extend that to harmony as well.

> ...I have written a (mostly) triadic piece where successive shifts of
> chromatic semitones, 36/35s, 49/48s, and a limma, adding up to a perfect
> fourth, have a certain melodic integrity, but only in 22-tet because all
> these intervals are represented by 55 cents! Any effect, no matter how
> unpleasant in isolation, can become beautiful if it becomes a basic,
> repeating structural element. Many in the avant-garde have noticed this.

I'm not sure quite what you mean, those 3 intervals don't add up to 4/3.
I'd like to hear your piece though. Is there any way I can?

Matt Nathan

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Date: Mon, 13 Jan 1997 08:02:16 -0800
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