reply to Stephen Soderberg

I haven't been taking about triads too much -- mostly "consonant"
tetrads and pentads -- but suffice it to say that I feel the
Balzano/Clough/Douthett approach to scales is bunk. The acoustical
nature of simple intervals is a much stronger organizing force in music
(at least the music I enjoy) than abstract set and group constructs.
Harry Partch devoted his life to exploring microtonality and the results
he puts forward are not to be taken lightly. For the most part, he is in
agreement with a millenia-old tradition of musician/mathematicians for
whom the acoustical "pull" of simple ratios is undeniable. At present,
at least three distinct psychoacoustical phenomena have been identified
which contribute to this impression, and octave equivalence is a fourth
factor which Balzano happily accepts while rejecting the others. Partch
has shown that music with a simple-ratio basis need not be
backward-looking, but can be as exciting and unexpected as any 20th
century music. It is heartening that most on this list seem to
understand that there is a relationship between frequency ratios and
consonance and are not content to choose frequencies just because their
logarithms make pretty necklace-like patterns (although that can be
important too).

I found this article while snooping around
on the web. Many of you should find it most amusing.

http://humanitas.ucsb.edu/users/steen/Abstracts/Tonality_96.html

- Joe Monzo
monz@juno.com
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html

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