Amplification, question, comment

Amplification. At least one crucial sentence sentence was missing from my
outline on pitch spacings: The initial characterization - as harmonic,
neutral, or subharmonic - may be made only on complexes with three or more
pitches.

A question. Jonathan Walker�s excellent tutorial mentions Pythagoras�s
comparison of the weights of hammers. I have encountered medieval
illustrations of this experiment, but am not familiar with a classical
source. In any case, comparing weights would not likely have lead to simple
ratios (anyone who has ever built a metallophone knows this - shape and
density being equally important). Even a comparison of weights hanging from
strings would have been inconclusive. String- and panpipe- lengths seem to
be the only successful classical means of determining ratios. Was the
hammer experiment performed to show a negative result?

A comment: The last tuning digest contained more discussion of Thai
seven-tone tunings, as continued to described them as equal. In practice,
which I have observed mostly in the related Cambodian ensembles and
repertoires, they are not (and the error is much greater than that we
accept for 12tet on the piano). The fixed pitched instruments may be said
to approach a 7-equal tuning, but singers and instruments with variable
pitches sing or play distinctly Major or minor thirds, depending upon
position in the 5-tone scale in use. The basic scalar template is 1 2 3 5
6, the interval 1-3 is almost always "major" and the 3/5, 6/1� intervals
are almost always minor. My sense is that the _inner melody_ of the music
is vocal, but that the fixed pitch instruments provide a framework for
transposition. (This is somewhat similar to what W. Carlos does, in using a
just tuning for synchronic structures and equal temperament for diachronic
structures; voices and variable pitched instruments in the Javanese gamelan
have a similar practice; come to think of it, Ivor Darreg built an electric
organ that did the same (making a virtue out of a design failure)).

Daniel Wolf

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g a r y :

Im wondering if the Bart Hopkins quote was from another mailinglist & if so,
which one? or whether from private correspondence?

thanks

Miekal And
the driftless academy of botanical apparitions

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