Re: [tuning] ingrained ivories [keyboard]

Joseph Pehrson wrote,

> I WAS comparing the "quasi jazz" chords that I made when I just
played familiar "keyboard patterns" with the new scales... But is
that, as I say again, so totally IRREVELANT... when it is the product
of such ingrained musicianship??...

This seems more like a question of whether a byproduct of the physical
(and mentally habituated) method of interface can be useful... and of
course I would say that it is if *it is!*... However, I don't see how
that makes it a relevant aspect of the tuning... kind of a "happy
accident" if it happens to work for you I would say...

> Does anyone else have an opinion on this topic?... or is it really
so irrelevant?? I would like to hear specifically from the "ingrained
ivory" set...

While this is more from the 'fretwire set' that it is from the "ivory
set," I think it should fit right in... Back when I first started
posting here I had an off-list back and forth with Paul Erlich (Paul,
does any of this ring a bell?), and while discussing guitars Paul said
that he had wanted to get several necks refretted in a series of equal
temperaments that were something like 26 through 31 (this is probably
wrong on the specifics, as it was quite awhile ago now, but that
doesn't really matter too much for the point that I'm trying to get
at). And my reaction was something like, 'why so many similar
frettings?' And Paul's reaction was something like, 'similar - What
are you talking about? These are all very different tunings...' And of
course he was right, but what I had meant was that if I were going to
have the opportunity to have a bunch of necks refretted, I would want
the frettings (i.e., the physical interface) to be of a wider and more
pronounced variety... because I do think -- though in the context of
that discussion it was more like something that I intuitively felt --
that the manner of interface is indeed important, and that it effects
what one can and can't do in a way that is important above and beyond
just the tunings themselves.

Dan

Joseph, you must understand that the way these scales (hexany, decatonics,
etc.) fall on the keyboard is something determined by Scala, and completely
foreign to the considerations of the inventors of these scales. You can map
them to the keyboard in many different ways, some of which could better
reflect the inherent structures of the scales, but the musical content of
the scales is unchanged. If you're approaching the subject from the
perspective of someone who already has a set of familiar fingering patterns
on the keyboard, a totally different (and yes, perfectly valid) set of
considerations would be appropriate to the question -- including, for
example, many arrangements that simply reshuffle 12-tET pitches. For
example, since you enjoy the effect of a 6-tone scale, with "tritones"
sounding like "octaves", you could explore all kinds of 6-tone scales found
within 12-tET and find endless fascination in doing so (no facetiousness
intended). However, that is not really the subject of this list.

>I DID read your paper,
>but I'm not understanding how it is done... except that you say
>something about starting another set at the pitch "E," or something of
>that nature. I'm mystified at this.

I'm surprised that my paper is so unclear to you. Is it that poorly written?
In any case, the idea is that 22-tone equal temperament is mapped to the
keyboard one note at a time ascending, except that the key "B" is skipped
over. The obvious result is that two keyboard octaves sounds like a regular
"octave", which helps navigation immensely. The not-so-obvious result is
that a symmetrical decatonic scale (and all its modes, of course) is formed
by playing just the black keys. So the black keys are the "naturals" in this
tuning, and the white keys are the "sharps" and "flats". All the key
signatures on the last page of my paper refer to this system.

The other keyboard mapping I refer to in my paper is a 12-tone mapping,
which puts 1/22 oct. between E and F and between B and C, and 2/22 oct. at
all other half-steps. Several different decatonic scales are available with
this mapping, plus the familiarity of the intervals should be a big help to
keyboardists like you.

I believe Manuel has implemented both of these mappings in Scala.

>And I WAS comparing the "quasi jazz" chords that I made when I just
>played familiar "keyboard patterns" with the new scales... But is that,
>as I say again, so totally IRREVELANT... when it is the product of such
>ingrained musicianship??...

It's, at best, a happy accident. Again, the mappings you were using were
totally foreign to considerations of any inherent logic in the scale.

Dan wrote,

>While this is more from the 'fretwire set' that it is from the "ivory
>set," I think it should fit right in... Back when I first started
>posting here I had an off-list back and forth with Paul Erlich (Paul,
>does any of this ring a bell?), and while discussing guitars Paul said
>that he had wanted to get several necks refretted in a series of equal
>temperaments that were something like 26 through 31 (this is probably
>wrong on the specifics, as it was quite awhile ago now, but that
>doesn't really matter too much for the point that I'm trying to get
>at). And my reaction was something like, 'why so many similar
>frettings?' And Paul's reaction was something like, 'similar - What
>are you talking about? These are all very different tunings...' And of
>course he was right, but what I had meant was that if I were going to
>have the opportunity to have a bunch of necks refretted, I would want
>the frettings (i.e., the physical interface) to be of a wider and more
>pronounced variety... because I do think -- though in the context of
>that discussion it was more like something that I intuitively felt --
>that the manner of interface is indeed important, and that it effects
>what one can and can't do in a way that is important above and beyond
>just the tunings themselves.

You're absolutely right, Dan, which is why I took the trouble, in my 22-tET
paper, to specify two different keyboard mappings.

I found the 22-tET guitar very comfortable, and figured that up to 31 frets
per octave shouldn't pose much of a problem, which is part of the reason I
made the proposal I did, another reason being that any pitch set I foresaw
using was pretty close to a subset of one of the ETs between 26 and 31, or
22, or 12; and given that, ETs are a nice choice, especially on a guitar
with straight frets. Granted, it would take a lot of conscious effort on any
of these guitars to unlearn one's playing habits and focus on the structures
unique to the tuning, but that's the kind of approach I would take if I went
to the trouble of having these guitars made at all.

I still have to go through most of this process with my 22-tET guitar, but
fortunately, the decatonic scales are extremely comfortable to play on the
22-tET guitar in the nearest thing to "standard" tuning -- in any position,
they require exactly four notes per string, and I happen to have four
fretting fingers on my fretting hand! I still need to work on patterns and
such . . . I'm still much more fluent with two- or three-note-per-string
patterns . . .