Going to extremes

> In the microtonal world, however, because of the unfamiliarity of
> the tonal materials, I think, not as much deviation is appropriate, as we

> may lose the meaning or structure of the original.

C(15) C(15) Bb(13) Cb(14)
G(09) A(11) F(06) Gb(08)
E(05) F(06) D(02) Eb(04)
A(11) D(02) G(08) Cb(14)
VI II V I

This is the chord progression I've used, in 15TET. For your information, it
is the tuning that has the largest wandering tonic, 80 cents. When I first
started to explore this tuning, the only documentation I had was
Blackwood's chord progressions.

I discovered this wandering tonic by accident, while I was writing ii V7 I
progressions in various tunings (7TET, 12TET, 18TET and 22TET). By the way,
the 22TET version sounds has a very powerful sound. I can send a short .mid
with the I IV V I in 22TET (staying on the same tonic) to anyone
interested.

After thinking for a certain time, I found a melody that was harmonised
using only ii V7 I. You've probably heard it, it was last week's microtonal
midi moment. Of course, I've used this new musical effect to the limit. I
do not want to start a musical revolution, I am just exploring.

BTW, I am not deaf, I can hear the very "special" sound that my music has.
It feels like you don't end up where you're supposed to. It took me a short
while to get used to this new sound. It is understandable that people
repudiate music whose basic structure is complex. The fact that music that
sounds too normal won't be noticed is also generaly accepted.

The problem is that I am now somewhere in between. If, in the back of your
mind, you do not believe that valuable music can be composed using
wandering tonics, your perception of the tonic will stay at the 1/1, and
when it goes down 80 cents, you will feel uncomfortable. But if you have
enough fate to accept the descending of the tonic, the wandering will
become natural, and it is normal music will make you feel a little
uncomfortable, because it will sound "too static".

Now, maybe you think that I am crazy. The same musical could be applied in
22TET, and be more "digestible", or more subtile. But 22 does not seem like
a challenge to me (for the time being), and I choose to dwelve in this new
unexplored territory, to "boldly go where no one has gone before", where
tonality is eternaly moving. (There are many other resources, I'll write
about them later.)

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>To what degree does atmospheric conditions affect music transmission and
>perception?
> o Temperature, Humidity and Pressure (aside from instrumental changes)

Uhmmm... Almost certainly the effect of humidity and temperature upon
the plain-and-simple comfort of the listener would VASTLY outweigh any
subtler effect of these parameters.




> o Motion of Observer-Listener? (like einstein relativity)

Surely I must misunderstand that question! Relativistic motion effects
have no meaning in any musical environment, for two obvious reasons and
many others:
1. If I remember the math correctly, relativistic effects will be on the order
of 1 MILLIONTH OF A PERCENT (almost certainly of no musical significance
whatsoever) at an airspeed of about 65 billion miles per hour. At that
speed, heat due to air-friction would incinerate any object capable of
generating or receiving a sound in a matter of nanoseconds. A few
nanoseconds (billionths of a second) is obviously far too short a time to
develop any sort of musical appreciation for whatever you're hearing!
2. Doppler effect in that sort of environment would turn KHz-range sound
frequencies into either the millihertz or Gigahertz range, either of which
is obviously FAR beyond any human's ability to hear.




> o Interference (nearby mechanical and electrical devices)

The possibilities - masking for example - are too numerous to list and
explore, even in cursory detail, in anything short of a book.

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