Doty request?

Greetings all,

I have been asked the following question here lately, and can't answer it in
time, perhaps someone here knows

" There must be a book out by a Mr. Doty called something like "Just
Intonation Primer". Do you know the exact title of the book and the full name
of the author, plus eventually the publisher and the year it was published."

If anybody here knows this book, I would appreciate hearing from you.

And where is B. Mclaren?? He was writing some of the most interesting stuff
here on this list. Does he know that??

Regards,
Ed Foote
Precision Piano Works
Nashville, Tn


Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl
with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Sun, 4 May 1997 12:38 +0200
Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA04049; Sun, 4 May 1997 12:38:15 +0200
Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA04035
Received: from by ella.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI)
id DAA20640; Sun, 4 May 1997 03:36:38 -0700
Date: Sun, 4 May 1997 03:36:38 -0700
Message-Id: <336C65E4.4D98@online.no>
Errors-To: madole@mills.edu
Reply-To: tuning@ella.mills.edu
Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu
Sender: tuning@ella.mills.edu

>Would somebody help me in explaining the differences between playing in
>Justatonic mode and Pythagorean mode?

Sure.

First of all, "Justonic" is a trade name of Justonic Tuning, Inc., in
Canada. Their name comes from the idea of "Just Intonation", which is the
general concept you're undoubtedly asking about.

Just Intonation is not any single tuning really, but instead a general
principle for choosing pitches, based upon making their sound-wave
frequencies in simple whole-number relations to one another, like 2:1 for
octaves, 3:2 for perfect fifths, 5:4 for major thirds, and many others.

As with "equal temperament" and "meantone", "just intonation" also
carries a historical meaning, which is a subset of the more recent,
generalized meaning. The major-scale tuning for the historical subset
meaning (example in C):

C D E F G A B C
1:1 9:8 5:4 4:3 3:2 5:3 15:8 2:1

This tuning came later, in Western culture anyway, than the
"pythagorean" tuning of:

C D E F G A B C
1:1 9:8 81:64 4:3 3:2 27:16 243:128 2:1

So that is the distinction between "pythagorean" and "just", even though
pythagorean is in fact just, since it's built upon whole-number ratios,
although 243:128 would hardly qualify as a "simple" whole-number ratio,
which is of course part of the reason why it evolved into 15:8 in most
scenarios.






>How can one learn to play in these modes without using electronic
>equipment?
>Is there any valid models used in learning how to use your ear to
>recognise these different modes?

It doesn't take a huge amount of effort for most competent and motivated
musicians to learn to hear new whole-number pitch relationships, although
it's deadly critical to bear in mind that how easy it is to hear them
depends greatly on how they're used. Well, it depends on the same factors
that playing in tune in any tuning depends upon: whether you're paying the
notes melodically or harmonically, how fast the notes are going by, and
such.

Probably the best way to get used to hearing these new pitch
relationships is a combination of mimicking pitch relationships from
recordings or electronic aids of whatever sort, and then try them out for
yourself, listening to beat rates in sustained chords. As you get a feel
for those beat rates, you simultaneously will get an increasingly more
secure feel for recognizing those intervals by their melodic pitch
distance.

Johnny Reinhard and his "AFFM" troopers routinely play a wide variety of
tunings on traditional acoustic instruments, Johnny himself mostly on
bassoon, using alternate fingerings.

Also with regard to nonelectronic instruments, lots of people
investigate new tunings by refretting guitars and other strings. That
works really well for a lot of people, and for certain styles of music.



Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl
with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Sun, 4 May 1997 16:54 +0200
Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA04233; Sun, 4 May 1997 16:54:15 +0200
Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA04146
Received: from by ella.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI)
id HAA23230; Sun, 4 May 1997 07:52:28 -0700
Date: Sun, 4 May 1997 07:52:28 -0700
Message-Id:
Errors-To: madole@mills.edu
Reply-To: tuning@ella.mills.edu
Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu
Sender: tuning@ella.mills.edu