"microdoodling" vs. micronoodling

Constructive criticisms of one another's music can have a place on this
forum, as can reviews which present both "subjective" and "objective"
aspects of a work. However, taking an overgeneralized, dismissive, and
patronizing tone towards one's fellow microtonalists is below the level of
discussion here. Music that touches some people's hearts will leave others
cold, that's the way it is. Neil, your music is no exception, having heard
opinions from several members of this list (and having formed my own
opinion). Subjects that are "quirky" and "vague" to some are relevant and
clear to others. Neil, the subjects you post about are, again, no
exception. You are a perfect target for all your own criticisms yet I would
never level them against you. You are passionate about what you do --
that's good enough in my book -- there's enough room in this world for all
our approaches. I would never presume to tell anyone how to direct their
musical energies unless they came to me specifically for guidance.

The only reason I think about music theory and discuss it on this list is
because I spend hours every day pouring my heart and soul into making
music, and seeing how powerfully it can move people (physically,
emotionally, spiritually). Otherwise it would be as interesting to me as
toaster engineering. Like you, Neil, I seek to understand the theory
better, but rather than accept mystical dogmas or ancient doctrines or buy
into a particular school of thought or drown in the vast sea of
misinformation, I question everything. If a theory doesn't agree with what
I hear, than at least one of the assumptions underlying it must be false.
This is not "fruitless speculation," it is throwing one's entire self,
including one's mind, into the pursuit of artistic expression. Many of your
own heroes, Neil, had a very cerebral approach to music, but that did not
get in the way of the reasons they were making music in the first place:
emotion, communication, spirituality.

Good luck to all of us in our own efforts to create!

P.S. For Doren Garcia, a third category: micropoodling!

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>> ETs and JI can both limit your vocabulary. But limits are good.
>That's profound.

Thanks.



>It may be helpful to think of limits in terms of _arbitrary_ and _necessary_.

That's an interesting distinction that I hadn't really thought about
before, or at least not as such. I that saying that 19TET and third-comma
meantone are identical would be a necessary limitation, in the sense that
our ears' pitch resolution is coarse enough that the difference between the
two is pointlessly small. And then there are limitations we can place on a
tuning system simply as a matter of convenience, or because it makes for an
interesting compositional environment.

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