Microtones in the blues

On Mon, 06 Apr 1998 05:31:35 -0700, Niel Haverstick wrote:
>
>... If you listen to blues, which is at the root of much
>contemporary pop, there's micronotes galore because of the
> bending and stretching that constantly goes on

On Tue, 7 Apr 1998 13:34:47 -0400, I wrote:
>
>Even though the 12-equal "7th" is between
>29 and 33 cents sharper than the 7th harmonic
>in all three chords, every chord in the blues
>*always* has it, and to me, this reinforces the
>idea that the 12-equal "7th" is intended by
>blues musicians to be interpreted as the 7th
>harmonic

Perhaps the *desire to compensate for the sharpness
of the 12tET 7th* by bending up lower chord members,
which Paul Erlich observed in connection with
Jimi Hendrix, is an old blues technique, which
may be the (or an) origin of all or much of the
pitch-bending that goes on in the blues.

Joseph L. Monzo
monz@juno.com
4940 Rubicam St., Philadelphia, PA 19144-1809, USA
phone 215 849 6723

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