RE: TUNING digest 955

Matt Nathan,

I have heard too much music from around the world performed vocally and
on continuous-pitch instruments which nonetheless gravitates toward a small
set of pitches to dismiss this as a result of the practicalities of
instrument making or other temporal or geographic biases. These pitch sets
are often very idiosyncratic and rarely contain any semblances of small
integers beyond the 3-limit.

>> ...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!

>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?

Which 3 intervals? I mentioned 4, and I did not specify the number of times
each occurs, except to say that the last occurs once. Well, numbering the
four intervals in question from 1 to 4, they go like this: 1 2 3 2 1 4 2 3
2. That adds up to a 4/3. I play this piece so much that people are humming
long sequences of successive 55-cent intervals, which tells me it's good
enough to include on my first tape of 22-tone music (I'm still waiting for
the guitar, though) despite its having nothing to do with my theories. So
I'll keep it to myself for now.


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On Mon, 13 Jan 1997, PAULE wrote:

>
>
> > Although improvisation may be a skill helpful to the
> > mastery of a particular musical instrument I am not convinced that in
> > itself it adds anything to ultimate musical experience. Nor do I feel
> > that improvisational skill leads to more creative musical expression. In
> > fact it much more readily falls into the realm of noodling than much of
> > the so-called Western classical repertoire.
>
> I let this sit for a while, but I find this positively repulsive.
>

Paul, It appears my statement needs some clarification--I think that in
reality we are more in agreement than you may suspect.

> (1) If you can hum what you're composing (a good sign that you're making
> music rather than marks on a page), then humming spontaneously (even slowly,
> and correcting errors) is improvisational skill. That may not be helpful to
> the mastery of a particular instrument, but it sure leads to better
> composition!

My understanding of improvisation is based on the notion that starting
from some given form, a performer, on the fly, may vary tempo, melodic or
harmonic structure to create something new. You seem to indicate here
that it is composition on the fly. Is there something special about how
fast someone composes? I have always felt that it is what one ends up
with that is important.

>
> (2) Many masters of instruments cannot improvise to save their lives. Many
> master improvisers create compositions in a realm very different from the
> five-line staff -- details will change from performance to performance,
> rhythms will transcend rational notation, the musical experience will
> reflect the immediate conditions of the moment, communication between
> audience and performer will occur -- in all, the music will have a structure
> that has more in common with real-time human thought processes.
>

Members of a good symphony orchestra are constantly in communication with
the "music" they are performing. Often this communion is profound and
deep, and to the extent this is accomplished, the music is unique, and
alive with subtle inflections of melodic and harmonic expression and the
audience is completely captivated and moved by the experience. Creativity
is in the expression of a phrase or even a single note--there is no need
for more or different notes.

> (3) Noodling on a staff is less musical than noodling on an instrument, and
> noodling on an instrument qualifies as poor improvisation at best.
>

I'll let this pass.


>
> (5) The ultimate musical experience. Hmm. Aside from that once-in-a-lifetime
> improvisation where it feels like your hands are controlled by a higher
> power, this would have to include listening to Jimi, or Duke, or one of Bach
> or Chopin's "frozen improvisations" (if only we could capture their actual
> performances out of the vibrations in the air). I'll skip Wynton Marsalis'
> jazz "compositions."

May I suggest that your experience with Jimi or the Duke is in precisely
the same category as Bach and Chopin--the old masters are in the form of
staves and notes, their music so inspiring that contemporary musicians
attempt to recreate their experience to share with the world--the young
"masters" are in electronic form, no less frozen than Beethoven. 100
years from now there may still be the possibility of a live, creative and
unique experience of Beethoven's 9th-- will we still have that same old
Hendrix?

I am equally eager to see 12ET supplanted by music which transcends in
expressiveness and communicates more deeply our human soul, for I too feel
its limitations. But we cannot throw away its profound legacy--we need to
build on it.

Thank you for your thoughts Paul.

Bruce Kanzelmeyer


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