thoughts on tuning

I just read a book on popular music in Oklahoma (Singing Cowboys and
all that Jazz; William Savage, Jr.)...a fascinating look at the
influence of Oklahoman musicians on popular American music, and it's
pretty amazing. For example, the first published blues song, "Dallas
Blues," by Hart Wand (a white guy), which was published in March, 1912,
predated W.C. Handy's "Memphis Blues," by several months...interesting.
There's lots more, but reading this book made me think about what we
tuning enthusiasts are doing, and how it relates to "pop" music.
For example, would a Woody Guthrie or Bob Dylan or Ramblin Jack
Elliott ever need a different tuning than 12 equal? When the medium is
folk songs, protest songs and such, where the lyrics, the verbal
message, is the thing...would 31 tones, or just intonation, or
Werckmeister tuning, make a difference to these sorts of artists? Would
"Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be any better in
a non 12 tuning? Of course, this is just speculation, and I am not
looking for a definitive answer. Thinking about this, though, makes me
wonder about who would benefit from venturing into non 12 tunings, and
why they would want to. I'm not sure that certain areas of American
music would be that much better off at all...12 eq is a nice, user
friendly system on a guitar, and lies easily under the hand...I've heard
even various microtonal guiitarists complain about the difficulty of
more than 17 or 22 notes per octave...hard to see folks sitting around
the campfire, singing to 31 equal...Hstick

[Neil Haverstick wrote:]
>I just read a book on popular music in Oklahoma (Singing Cowboys and
>all that Jazz; William Savage, Jr.)...a fascinating look at the
>influence of Oklahoman musicians on popular American music, and it's
>pretty amazing. For example, the first published blues song, "Dallas
>Blues," by Hart Wand (a white guy), which was published in March, 1912,
>predated W.C. Handy's "Memphis Blues," by several months...interesting.
>There's lots more, but reading this book made me think about what we
>tuning enthusiasts are doing, and how it relates to "pop" music.
> For example, would a Woody Guthrie or Bob Dylan or Ramblin Jack
>Elliott ever need a different tuning than 12 equal? When the medium is
>folk songs, protest songs and such, where the lyrics, the verbal
>message, is the thing...would 31 tones, or just intonation, or
>Werckmeister tuning, make a difference to these sorts of artists? Would
>"Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be any better
>in a non 12 tuning? Of course, this is just speculation, and I am not
>looking for a definitive answer. Thinking about this, though, makes me
>wonder about who would benefit from venturing into non 12 tunings, and
>why they would want to. I'm not sure that certain areas of American
>music would be that much better off at all...12 eq is a nice, user
>friendly system on a guitar, and lies easily under the hand...I've
>heard even various microtonal guiitarists complain about the difficulty
>of more than 17 or 22 notes per octave...hard to see folks sitting
>around the campfire, singing to 31 equal...Hstick

Very interesting observations! And, coming from someone who is
proficient in, and loves, music tuned other than 12-tET, all the more
convincing.

I have to agree. 12-tET is extremely serviceable, and its flaws do not
obscure the beauty of most music for which it is used.

For the campfire, 12-tET may rule forever. For the studio, for the
discriminating ear, other options will eventually triumph, I believe.

JdL

Neil Haverstick wrote:
>
> Thinking about this, though, makes me
> wonder about who would benefit from venturing into non 12 tunings, and
> why they would want to.

It makes the music more expressive and colorful.

db

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

Hi Neil,

Ideally, to my mind anyway, tunings will always just be a component of
(great) music and not an overly exaggerated focal point.

And while I, like many on this list I'm sure, am all for shaking the
stale air out of the omnipresent twelve-tone equal temperament
monopoly, your post is a sobering reminder of how entrenched and
difficult a "job" that's really going to be.

The stockpile and mass proliferation of 12-tET instruments... the
general prevailing lack of knowing that other tunings even exist...
these types of things don't seem as though they're going to budge
(much) for a long, long, long time!

--Dan Stearns

One of the problems with 12tet is so many of the permutations have been
explored, theres no way to put three or four (or even 12!) notes together
and make a sound that hasn't been made a zillion times already. With
alternate tunings there is the excitement of making harmonies that sound new
and unexplored.

Although re-tuning 12tet music may be interesting as an exercise, the real
creative work comes from exploring the new tunings in their own right and
making music the like of which noone has ever heard before.

Supposedly there are colors on the astral plane, visible to clairvoyant
consciousness, that have no counterpart in the physical world. Imagine a
painter "getting hold" of these new colors and using them in paintings for
the first time, his excitement. Well boys and girls, thats what we get to do
with sound!

Dante

[Dante Rosati wrote:]
>Although re-tuning 12tet music may be interesting as an exercise, the
>real creative work comes from exploring the new tunings in their own
>right and making music the like of which noone has ever heard before.

Have you heard, for example, the Mozart kv616 tuned to COFT on my web
site (www.adaptune.com)? Do you really think this is an "interesting
exercise" as opposed to a genuine expression of the natural beauty of
this piece?

I do agree that the greatest achievements of non-12-tET music have yet
to come; like probably most on this list, I have a desire to participate
in generating new compositions to wow the world. But I would quibble
with your assertion that applying tuning to existing pieces is "not
creative".

JdL

----- Original Message -----
From: John A. deLaubenfels <jdl@adaptune.com>
> Have you heard, for example, the Mozart kv616 tuned to COFT on my web
> site (www.adaptune.com)? Do you really think this is an "interesting
> exercise" as opposed to a genuine expression of the natural beauty of
> this piece?

umm...yes. It >is< a midi file after all, not Gieseking.

>
> I do agree that the greatest achievements of non-12-tET music have yet
> to come; like probably most on this list, I have a desire to participate
> in generating new compositions to wow the world. But I would quibble
> with your assertion that applying tuning to existing pieces is "not
> creative".

Sorry John I did not mean to step on any toes. I was replying to Neil's post
where he asks:

>Would "Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be any better
in
>a non 12 tuning?

My point was simply that music conceived in 12tet no doubt sounds best in
12tet. (Of course Mozart does not fall into this category) If a painter does
a picture in black and white it might be "interesting" to make a version in
color (or visa-versa) to illustrate something or other, but I don't think
anyone would mistake that for the artist's original creative act.

Certainly theory and analysis are "creative" activities. But just as the
same word in the two statements, "I love my family" and "I love ice-cream"
mean two different things really, I think Mozart's compositions and your
tuning experiments on them are two different things also, though both are
"creative".

Dante

[I wrote:]
>>Have you heard, for example, the Mozart kv616 tuned to COFT on my web
>>site (www.adaptune.com)? Do you really think this is an "interesting
>>exercise" as opposed to a genuine expression of the natural beauty of
>>this piece?

[Dante Rosati:]
>umm...yes. It >is< a midi file after all, not Gieseking.

It is. I'm not familiar with Gieseking, but if the point is that midi
files aren't the equal of live performances on acoustic grand pianos,
no argument! The COFT specification could, of course, be applied to a
fixed-pitch instrument if it were desired.

[JdL:]
>>I do agree that the greatest achievements of non-12-tET music have yet
>>to come; like probably most on this list, I have a desire to
>>participate in generating new compositions to wow the world. But I
>>would quibble with your assertion that applying tuning to existing
>>pieces is "not creative".

[Dante:]
>Sorry John I did not mean to step on any toes. I was replying to Neil's
>post where he asks:

[Neil:]
>>Would "Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be any
>>better in a non 12 tuning?

[Dante:]
>My point was simply that music conceived in 12tet no doubt sounds best
>in 12tet. (Of course Mozart does not fall into this category).

Such a categorical statement! To my ears, definitely not true.

[Dante:]
>If a painter does a picture in black and white it might be
>"interesting" to make a version in color (or visa-versa) to illustrate
>something or other, but I don't think anyone would mistake that for
>the artist's original creative act.

Is the "artist's original creative act" the most important thing, or is
the promotion and ongoing rebirth of lovely music?

[Dante:]
>Certainly theory and analysis are "creative" activities. But just as
>the same word in the two statements, "I love my family" and "I love
>ice-cream" mean two different things really, I think Mozart's
>compositions and your tuning experiments on them are two different
>things also, though both are "creative".

But, in your mind, apparently what I'm doing is "ice-cream." So noted.
However, if it needs to be stated, I'm certainly NOT trying to equate
my work to Mozart's creative acts! I AM saying that work of this sort
may provide genuine refinements which enhance rather than degrade the
compositional achievements of past masters.

JdL

----- Original Message -----
From: John A. deLaubenfels <jdl@adaptune.com>
>I AM saying that work of this sort
> may provide genuine refinements which enhance rather than degrade the
> compositional achievements of past masters.

I think it neither enhances nor degrades Mozart, any more than does a
Schenker graph. Let me put it this way: retuning experiments are more about
tuning theory than they are about the music being retuned. Does that make
more sense?

Dante

[I wrote:]
>>I AM saying that work of this sort may provide genuine refinements
>>which enhance rather than degrade the compositional achievements of
>>past masters.

[Dante:]
>I think it neither enhances nor degrades Mozart, any more than does a
>Schenker graph. Let me put it this way: retuning experiments are more
>about tuning theory than they are about the music being retuned. Does
>that make more sense?

Well, my original post on this topic included the statement:

12-tET is extremely serviceable, and its flaws do not obscure the
beauty of most music for which it is used.

Which would seem to come close to agreement with your last statement.
I wouldn't go the final distance, but we'll have to leave that gap
unbridged for the moment, I suspect.

JdL

[I wrote:]
>>I AM saying that work of this sort may provide genuine refinements
>>which enhance rather than degrade the compositional achievements of
>>past masters.

[Dante:]
>I think it neither enhances nor degrades Mozart, any more than does a
>Schenker graph. Let me put it this way: retuning experiments are more
>about tuning theory than they are about the music being retuned. Does
>that make more sense?

Surely you would agree that if, say, I reversed the direction of my
tunings relative to 12-tET, Mozart would be degraded. This statement
does not imply that my tunings are better than 12-tET, but it asserts
that it is possible to do harm, and possibly good, to a piece as it
originally stands.

Retuning experiments are about tuning theory, yes. But what is tuning
theory: some abstraction? No, it is an attempt to figure out how to
wrest the most possible beauty out of music. I do not think of myself
as a "theorist" in any case; I am someone who loves music and wants to
maximize my enjoyment of a given performance of it. Getting chords to
tend toward JI is a big help, as far as my perception goes. You are
right to say that tuning theory does not focus on any one composer vs.
another, but certain tradeoffs are applicable to many composers.

Of course, I don't deny that discordance is an integral part of some
pieces of music; these would be ill-served by attempts to move their
tuning toward JI. As far as I can tell, however, this does not apply to
Mozart or to many other composers over a broad range of time.

JdL

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "John A. deLaubenfels" <jdl@a...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14498

> I do agree that the greatest achievements of non-12-tET music have
yet to come; like probably most on this list, I have a desire to
participate in generating new compositions to wow the world. But I
would quibble with your assertion that applying tuning to existing
pieces is "not creative".
>
> JdL

Listening to John deLaubenfels retuning of a Schubert sonata (I don't
remember the number and I don't see it on John's site) was one of the
first things I did when I started on the Tuning List, and it was one
of the most exhilarating.

Comparing John's various 5 and 7 limit just versions with the
"normal" one and following with the score was a magnificent exercise
in "warped" perception -- although it was the 12-tET that ultimately
became "warped."

It was exhilarating, and altered my perception about past musics, and
probably about future musics. If that kind of work isn't creative, I
don't know what is...

____________ ____ _ _
Joseph Pehrson

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Rosati" <dante@p...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14501

>>
> >Would "Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be
any better in a non 12 tuning?
>

Well, nobody has mentioned some really obvious factors about all of
this... so I might as well contribute with some kind of dumb post
on the subject...

Much of the 60's music, if I can remember back that far (of course, I
wasn't born yet.. ha, ha) had a significant textual and theatrical
element. I would suggest that TUNING, per se, was decidedly
secondary.

In fact, I would suggest that many of the guitars at that time were
not tuned in 12-equal. They were in a kind of "natural" tuning that
would, fortunately, defy classification...

__________ ____ __ _
Joseph Pehrson

>>Would "Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be
>>any better in a non 12 tuning?

>In fact, I would suggest that many of the guitars at that time were
>not tuned in 12-equal. They were in a kind of "natural" tuning that
>would, fortunately, defy classification...

???

Bob Dylan's guitar on his own recordings was often tuned so that the tonic
chord was closer to JI, and then the other chords would of course be warped
due to the 12-tET frets. I don't know about classification, but this
certainly could be quantified.

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Joseph Pehrson" <pehrson@p...> wrote:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14517

> --- In tuning@egroups.com, "Rosati" <dante@p...> wrote:
>
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14501
>
> >
> > Would "Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's,
> > be any better in a non 12 tuning?
> >
>
> Much of the 60's music, if I can remember back that far (of
> course, I wasn't born yet.. ha, ha) had a significant textual
> and theatrical element. I would suggest that TUNING, per se,
> was decidedly secondary.

As a matter of fact, Joe and Dante, in this particular case
the tuning is an essential part of the performance! 'Blowin'
In the Wind' was definitely the wrong song to pick to make
this point!

Certainly Bob Dylan's guitar, if not tuned *exactly* in 12-tET,
was close enough to it that one can't notice a difference. But
his *vocals*, now, that's another story altogether.

I would argue that a very big part of the huge impact Dylan
had on music in the 1960s was the extreme microtonality of his
vocals. And it was deliberate.

If you've ever heard 'Lay Lady Lay', then you know that Dylan
actually *could* sing in something like a 'typical' tuning and
vocal style. So all that stuff about how 'he sounds like a frog
with his foot caught in a fence' in his '60s songs fails to
take into account the fact that he *meant* to sound like that!

Yes indeed, Dylan's vocals on his great string of 1960s albums
were a microtonal _tour de force_ if there ever was one.

-monz
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Paul H. Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14519

> ???
>
> Bob Dylan's guitar on his own recordings was often tuned so that
the tonic chord was closer to JI, and then the other chords would of
course be warped due to the 12-tET frets. I don't know about
classification, but this certainly could be quantified.

OK. Great, Paul... but you seem to be agreeing that there was more
to the tuning of some of these standards than 12-tET... (???)

Joseph

Joseph wrote,

>OK. Great, Paul... but you seem to be agreeing that there was more
>to the tuning of some of these standards than 12-tET... (???)

You bet. Like rap, Bob Dylan's music can sound simple and banal until you
try to perform it yourself, to evoke the feelings that it evokes. Now the
deviations from 12-tET on Bob Dylan's guitar were for the most part
accidental -- once one tunes the tonic chord, one gets a a haphazard pattern
of tuning "errors" for other chord forms -- but there are probably cases
where a specific "mistuning" let to artistically valuable effects, no doubt
heightened by Bob's vocals.

sorry if this comes through twice- the first one i sent seems to have gotten
lost.

----- Original Message -----
From: John A. deLaubenfels <jdl@adaptune.com>
> Surely you would agree that if, say, I reversed the direction of my
> tunings relative to 12-tET, Mozart would be degraded. This statement
> does not imply that my tunings are better than 12-tET, but it asserts
> that it is possible to do harm, and possibly good, to a piece as it
> originally stands.

It could be argued that using any tuning other than the one Mozart played in
is a "degradation", although I think that word is a little too strong in
this context. I don't know how interested Mozart was in tuning issues, I
would guess not much. He would probably be more interested in how the
performer was playing rather than subtle differences in tuning.This is
similar to the period instrument question. While it is of interest to us to
hear his music on the pianos of his day, I'm sure he would have been tickled
pink to play a modern Steinway. Would he even have noticed the tuning?

Dante

----- Original Message -----
From: John A. deLaubenfels <jdl@adaptune.com>
> Surely you would agree that if, say, I reversed the direction of my
> tunings relative to 12-tET, Mozart would be degraded. This statement
> does not imply that my tunings are better than 12-tET, but it asserts
> that it is possible to do harm, and possibly good, to a piece as it
> originally stands.

It could be argued that using any tuning other than the one Mozart played in
is a "degradation", although I think that word is a little too strong in
this context. I don't know how interested Mozart was in tuning issues, I
would guess not much. He would probably be more interested in how the
performer was playing rather than subtle differences in tuning.This is
similar to the period instrument question. While it is of interest to us to
hear his music on the pianos of his day, I'm sure he would have been tickled
pink to play a modern Steinway. Would he even have noticed the tuning?

Dante

dante writes:

<<It could be argued that using any tuning other than the one Mozart played in
is a "degradation", although I think that word is a little too strong in
this context.

Greetings,
I suppose what is degraded could be a topic in itself. The intention of
the composer? Perhaps not, hard to judge. The emotional impact of the
presentation itself? I vote probably. Variety of tempering in the thirds
creates a very accessible harmonic texture.
The changing of the tuning for Mozart is the subject of our next CD,
where we will present the K385 in three tunings. Listening to the ET version
after one on the Prelleur temperament is enlightening, to say the least.

>I don't know how interested Mozart was in tuning issues, I
would guess not much. He would probably be more interested in how the
performer was playing rather than subtle differences in tuning.

I submit that he would not have been thinking of the performers while
composing, and it is there that his concept of keys and their characters
would have shown the influence of his formative, harmonic years.

>This is similar to the period instrument question. While it is of interest
to us to
hear his music on the pianos of his day, I'm sure he would have been tickled
pink to play a modern Steinway. Would he even have noticed the tuning?>>

I think so. If in ET, he would surely have noticed the sameness to the
keys. Even musicians today that become acquainted with well tempered
keyboards are invariably struck by what ET really sounds like when they
return to it. Mozart would certainly have been at least as sensitive, no?
Regards,
Ed Foote
Nashville, Tn.

John Starrett wrote,

>It is
>entirely possible that the music in the composer's head is
>in meantone of some sort, or just, or deLaubentone and that
>he accepted the limitations of the musicians, orchestras and
>instruments of the time and just went ahead and wrote it
>down in 12tet notation.

Or, more likely, each composition falls somewhere along the continuum
between being conceived with infinite pitch accuracy in the composer's head,
and being shaped by whatever tuning system/notation system the composer was
writing for.

On Tue, 17 Oct 2000, Monz wrote:

> As a matter of fact, Joe and Dante, in this particular case
> the tuning is an essential part of the performance! 'Blowin'
> In the Wind' was definitely the wrong song to pick to make
> this point!
>
> Certainly Bob Dylan's guitar, if not tuned *exactly* in 12-tET,
> was close enough to it that one can't notice a difference. But
> his *vocals*, now, that's another story altogether.
>
> I would argue that a very big part of the huge impact Dylan
> had on music in the 1960s was the extreme microtonality of his
> vocals. And it was deliberate.

Well, I was there ... the impact for me was the lyrics more than the
tuning. Dylan formed his vocal style from *numerous* other singers, both
black/blues and white/folk, so it's natural to assume some African influences.
But there were folk singers who had very melodic voices -- Phil Ochs,
for example -- and those who had voices forged from too many shots of
whiskey and too many cigarettes -- Dave Van Ronk, for example. Dylan
sounded a lot more like Woody Guthrie and Dave Van Ronk and Eric Von
Schmidt than he did like, say, Big Bill Broonzy, Leadbelly or even Pete
Seeger. If you must go looking for "microtonality" in 60s folk music,
go after the singers who emulated the black models, such as Koerner, Ray and
Glover. Or the real thing -- Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry :-).

> If you've ever heard 'Lay Lady Lay', then you know that Dylan
> actually *could* sing in something like a 'typical' tuning and
> vocal style. So all that stuff about how 'he sounds like a frog
> with his foot caught in a fence' in his '60s songs fails to
> take into account the fact that he *meant* to sound like that!

Well ... he meant to sound like his models. What was *unique* about
Dylan was the lyrics. "Hollis Brown", for example, is "Pretty Polly"
with Dylan's words.

> Yes indeed, Dylan's vocals on his great string of 1960s albums
> were a microtonal _tour de force_ if there ever was one.

Well, I have the "bootleg" CD set with some Dylan from those days ... I
can certainly listen for "deliberate microntonality", assuming my ear is
good enough to hear it. I would expect it to be a much more difficult
search than one would have in *jazz* :-).

--
znmeb@teleport.com (M. Edward Borasky) http://www.teleport.com/~znmeb

If they named a street after Picabo Street, would it be called Picabo
Street, Street Street or Picabo Street Street?

>> JdL
>
>Listening to John deLaubenfels retuning of a Schubert sonata (I don't
>remember the number and I don't see it on John's site) was one of the
>first things I did when I started on the Tuning List, and it was one
>of the most exhilarating.

John ,

Is this Schubert sonata still available to hear ? I would very much like to
experience it also. I am new to the list and am still coming to terms with
alot of the
terminology , etc. Audible experience is always good !

Buddhi>
>____________ ____ _ _
>Joseph Pehrson
>
>
>
>You do not need web access to participate. You may subscribe through
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mode.
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emails.
>
>
>

Folksingers often use different guitar tunings. The so-called "open"
tunings, where all six strings are part of a chord, are very popular. Given
a guitar tuned to an open just chord and fretted with semitone steps, as one
moved up the frets with a barre, one would play a chromatic scale of just
chords, right? :-)

--
M. Edward Borasky
mailto:znmeb@teleport.com
http://www.borasky-research.com

Cold leftover pizza: it's not just for breakfast any more!

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Paul H. Erlich [mailto:PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM]
> Sent: Tuesday, October 17, 2000 12:47 PM
> To: 'tuning@egroups.com'
> Subject: RE: [tuning] Re: thoughts on tuning
>
>
> >>Would "Blowin in the Wind," one of the anthems of the 1960's, be
> >>any better in a non 12 tuning?
>
> >In fact, I would suggest that many of the guitars at that time were
> >not tuned in 12-equal. They were in a kind of "natural" tuning that
> >would, fortunately, defy classification...
>
> ???
>
> Bob Dylan's guitar on his own recordings was often tuned so that the tonic
> chord was closer to JI, and then the other chords would of course
> be warped
> due to the 12-tET frets. I don't know about classification, but this
> certainly could be quantified.
>
>
> You do not need web access to participate. You may subscribe through
> email. Send an empty email to one of these addresses:
> tuning-subscribe@egroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@egroups.com - unsubscribe from the tuning group.
> tuning-nomail@egroups.com - put your email message delivery on
> hold for the tuning group.
> tuning-digest@egroups.com - change your subscription to daily
> digest mode.
> tuning-normal@egroups.com - change your subscription to
> individual emails.
>
>
>

----- Original Message -----
From: M. Edward Borasky <znmeb@teleport.com>

> Folksingers often use different guitar tunings. The so-called "open"
> tunings, where all six strings are part of a chord, are very popular.
Given
> a guitar tuned to an open just chord and fretted with semitone steps, as
one
> moved up the frets with a barre, one would play a chromatic scale of just
> chords, right? :-)

Each chord would be just, but they would not be in just relationship to each
other. A rather bizarre hybrid tuning, come to think of it.

Dante

[Joseph Pehrson wrote:]
>>Listening to John deLaubenfels retuning of a Schubert sonata (I don't
>>remember the number and I don't see it on John's site) was one of the
>>first things I did when I started on the Tuning List, and it was one
>>of the most exhilarating.

[Buddhi Wilcox:]
>Is this Schubert sonata still available to hear ? I would very much
>like to experience it also. I am new to the list and am still coming to
>terms with alot of the terminology , etc. Audible experience is always
>good !

Welcome to the list, Buddhi! If you have the capability of playing
General Midi (GM) files, I've got some, including the Schubert D894
sonata that Joe is referring to (I think that's the only Schubert
sonata I've posted). Go to:

http://www.adaptune.com

Then enter Studio J, and scroll around. Most of the tunings there do
not, unfortunately, include my very latest refinements, grounding to
COFT, but the ones at the top do. Try, for example, wamk280 or kv616
if you're a Mozart fan. The Brahms piano sonatas are really lovely,
IMHO, and illustrate my methods to good advantage.

Let me know what you think!

JdL

[Dante:]
>>It could be argued that using any tuning other than the one Mozart
>>played in is a "degradation", although I think that word is a little
>>too strong in this context.

[Ed Foote:]
>I suppose what is degraded could be a topic in itself. The intention
>of the composer? Perhaps not, hard to judge. The emotional impact of
>the presentation itself? I vote probably. Variety of tempering in the
>thirds creates a very accessible harmonic texture.

Ed, of all the arguments I've heard against applying adaptive quasi-JI
to past works, yours carries by far the most weight with me. To the
extent that your statements are true (and I suspect that, for some
specific works at least, they are very true), what I'm doing IS a
degradation in some real way; I am robbing the work of something that is
arguably important to its overall structure, and to the experience that
the composer means us to take from hearing it.

It is an interesting challenge to try to sort out the cases in which a
composer (long dead) was deliberately making use of the characteristics
of a particular tuning, rather than making do with a known compromise.

[Ed:]
>The changing of the tuning for Mozart is the subject of our next CD,
>where we will present the K385 in three tunings. Listening to the ET
>version after one on the Prelleur temperament is enlightening, to say
>the least.

I must have this CD! Please let us know when it's out. BTW, could you
give the numbers on the Prelleur temperament?

JdL

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "John A. deLaubenfels" <jdl@a...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14569

> [Ed Foote:]
> >I suppose what is degraded could be a topic in itself. The
intention of the composer? Perhaps not, hard to judge. The
emotional impact of the presentation itself? I vote probably.
Variety of tempering in the thirds creates a very accessible harmonic
texture.
>
> Ed, of all the arguments I've heard against applying adaptive
quasi-JI to past works, yours carries by far the most weight with me.
To the extent that your statements are true (and I suspect that, for
some specific works at least, they are very true), what I'm doing IS
a degradation in some real way; I am robbing the work of something
that is arguably important to its overall structure, and to the
experience that the composer means us to take from hearing it.
>
> It is an interesting challenge to try to sort out the cases in
which a composer (long dead) was deliberately making use of the
characteristics of a particular tuning, rather than making do with a
known compromise.
>

Well, how about adding this thought to the mix;

It is ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE for us to listen to the harmonic language
or TUNING of PAST composers and past musics in the way and with the
effect they were listened to AT THE TIME!

We are listening though lenses "colored" by 21 century (and earlier)
developments, be they the chromaticism via Wagner through
Schoen-babbitt or, in the pop realm, by the sampling nature of ALL
sounds, strung together in contemporary hybrid media zap society...

Since we CANNOT, I believe, listen to ANYTHING of the past with the
ears of the past, why not try different LISTENING LENSES on past
musics?? It will not, ultimately, make any difference, but will only
add to our present experience, since the veracity of the listening OF
THAT TIME is unattainable...

(??)
________ ____ __ _
Joseph Pehrson

Joseph writes:
<<It is ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE for us to listen to the harmonic language
or TUNING of PAST composers and past musics in the way and with the
effect they were listened to AT THE TIME!

Greetings,
I agree, and am damn glad of it, otherwise, I would have to have some TB,
maybe a plague in the audience, fleas and everything else the average 18th
century music lover might have to suffer. The total experience of being an
original listener of Mozart's, I don't want.
I want it in a clean mix, through a set of balanced speakers and plenty of
RMS, with the fridge nearby. Or a comfortable chair in a cool auditorium,
listening to someone maneuver a big Steinway through the repertoire. I only
want the good parts of the score.
It was an epiphany many years ago, when here in Nashville, I walked over
to the Parthenon one night. (We have a full scale replication of the
original here), The lights were on, making the special surface material look
like the original did in daylight. I realized that I was looking at the
western end of the building from a small hill, seeing a perspective that the
original designers, builder, and users had NEVER been privilidged to see.
The building's perfection was still beautifully evident, even though this
particular perspective hadn't been available with the original.
So it may also be with the temperaments. Some would hold that the true
beauty of Mozart requires equal temperament. I don't agree, but I don't need
to. There are alternatives that are far more descriptive than words. Today
we can make comparisons that Mozart never had. We can decide for ourselves
if this or that intonation creates more of an emotional response. And that
is what I think we are mainly looking for, the creation of emotional events.
If certain changes in the tempering, coupled with the compositions that
happened at their times, increases the emotional pull, then I begin shoveling
value judgements around. I have done this with Beethoven, and now Mozart and
the five others, and am convinced that ET is the lesser tuning for most
piano music. I will wait to hear what others might get from it.

>>Since we CANNOT, I believe, listen to ANYTHING of the past with the
ears of the past, why not try different LISTENING LENSES on past
musics?? It will not, ultimately, make any difference, but will only
add to our present experience, since the veracity of the listening OF
THAT TIME is unattainable...>>

I agree, I like the idea of lenses, so wait till we can talk about the Chopin
#66 we have recorded on the DeMorgan Temperament! (same CD) Ya wanna talk
about lenses? This is exactly that.

Regards,
Ed Foote
Nashville, Tn.

Dante Rosati wrote,

>Each chord would be just, but they would not be in just relationship to
each
>other.

Just like adaptive JI!

>A rather bizarre hybrid tuning, come to think of it.

See, John deL? The very concept of adaptive JI has been almost completely
ignored by most tuning thinkers. And yet, Dante, its advantages over strict
JI and over ETs are enough to make you forget about both -- if you're
dealing with completely flexible instruments.

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul H. Erlich <PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM>
> See, John deL? The very concept of adaptive JI has been almost completely
> ignored by most tuning thinkers. And yet, Dante, its advantages over
strict
> JI and over ETs are enough to make you forget about both -- if you're
> dealing with completely flexible instruments.

Advantages for doing what? Isn't it just another way of tuning? I'm sure a
good musician could use it to good effect just as much as JI or ET. You may
say it enables you to modulate freely and retain just chords, but why is
that better or worse than any other situation? Isn't it just what it is? In
a way, it ends up being like ET in the sense that all keys are "the same",
so you could just as easily call it a "disadvantage". I prefer not to look
for "the one true tuning" but rather acknowledge the almost unlimited
possibilities of tuning, all of equal interest and of potential fecundity in
the right hands.

Dante

Dante Rosati wrote,

>Advantages for doing what? Isn't it just another way of tuning? I'm sure a
>good musician could use it to good effect just as much as JI or ET. You may
>say it enables you to modulate freely and retain just chords, but why is
>that better or worse than any other situation?

If you're trying to apply the sonic excellence of JI chords (which you of
all people should be endorsing) to a piece classical music, you need this.
Even without modulation, progressions like I-vi-ii-V-I or I-IV-ii-V-I
clearly show the advantages of this approach.

>Isn't it just what it is? In
>a way, it ends up being like ET in the sense that all keys are "the same",
>so you could just as easily call it a "disadvantage". I prefer not to look
>for "the one true tuning" but rather acknowledge the almost unlimited
>possibilities of tuning, all of equal interest and of potential fecundity
in
>the right hands.

Agreed, agreed. But to the aesthetic sensibilities that John and I share,
and no doubt many others who fall in between John and I in opinion, this
method clearly seems like the right one for the task at hand -- taking
pieces written, for the most part, in 12 pitches, and nudging the chords
more or less toward JI without disturbing the melodic continuity of the
piece. John and I have has some disagreements on the specifics (i.e.,
5-limit vs. 7-limit for certain composers), and as you should know from my
comments to Dave Keenan last night, I agree with you that many completely
different approaches and goals can lead to musically valuable results. But
for retuning common-practice compositions to reduce sonic "pain", this is
the way to go.

John deLaubenfels wrote,

>Ed, of all the arguments I've heard against applying adaptive quasi-JI
>to past works, yours carries by far the most weight with me. To the
>extent that your statements are true (and I suspect that, for some
>specific works at least, they are very true), what I'm doing IS a
>degradation in some real way; I am robbing the work of something that is
>arguably important to its overall structure, and to the experience that
>the composer means us to take from hearing it.

>It is an interesting challenge to try to sort out the cases in which a
>composer (long dead) was deliberately making use of the characteristics
>of a particular tuning, rather than making do with a known compromise.

With Mozart, there is no consensus about this, with Daniel Wolf having made
very forceful and convincing arguments that Mozart essentially thought in
extended meantone. With Beethoven, it's a different story altogether.

I absolutely agree with you, Joseph. Fortunately, we do have detailed
accounts of quite a few musicians' reactions to various intervals and
tunings from these eras, so one should at least study these in order to come
that extra bit closer to understanding the effects that were heard at the
time.

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul H. Erlich <PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM>

> If you're trying to apply the sonic excellence of JI chords (which you of
> all people should be endorsing)

do tunings need to be "endorsed"? I think they are just meant to be played
with. I'm not sure if what I like about JI is "sonic excellence" so much as
conceptual simplicity and new colors for the 12ET-jaded pallete.

> Agreed, agreed. But to the aesthetic sensibilities that John and I share,
> and no doubt many others who fall in between John and I in opinion, this
> method clearly seems like the right one for the task at hand -- taking
> pieces written, for the most part, in 12 pitches, and nudging the chords
> more or less toward JI without disturbing the melodic continuity of the
> piece.

Yes, of course. I thought you were saying it had some compositional
advantages over JI or ET. My mistake.

> for retuning common-practice compositions to reduce sonic "pain", this is
> the way to go.

hmm.. "sonic pain"? I can't say I've ever felt "pain" when listening to
Mozart on an ET piano. I think I'd rather say "for retuning common-practice
compositions to hear what they sound like in adaptive-JI, adaptive-JI is the
way to go."

Dante

Dante wrote,

>hmm.. "sonic pain"? I can't say I've ever felt "pain" when listening to
>Mozart on an ET piano.

I have, but only after spending a lot of time in meantone. Those parallel
thirds especially grate on my ear in ET.

>I think I'd rather say "for retuning common-practice
>compositions to hear what they sound like in adaptive-JI, adaptive-JI is
the
>way to go."

I'd go much further. If you don't want the "grating" of ET, but don't want
the comma shifts/drifts and other "painful" problems of strict JI, adaptive
JI is the way to go.

>I'm not sure if what I like about JI is "sonic excellence"

Really? Honestly? That was not the impression I got from your website, etc.

>so much as
>conceptual simplicity

??? you mean like simple ratios? Didn't you place your frets _by ear_?
Doesn't this speak to the _acoustical_ rather than conceptual simplicity of
JI? Any temperament that removes one or more commas seems conceptually
simpler for a musician than JI.

>and new colors for the 12ET-jaded pallete.

Again, nothing special about JI there.

Dante, 22- and 31-tET are conceptually simple and have plenty of new colors.
Would you be open to playing guitars in those tunings, if cost were not an
issue?

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Paul H. Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14583

>Fortunately, we do have
detailed accounts of quite a few musicians' reactions to various
intervals and tunings from these eras, so one should at least study
these in order to come that extra bit closer to understanding the
effects that were heard at the time.

That makes sense. I suppose at some point somebody, in the interest
of "scholarship" will want to "legislate" -- determine which kinds of
retuning experiments are "appropriate" for any given era.

As far as I personally am concerned, though, I enjoy any
"distortions" of the classics if they lead to new perceptions and new
understandings of the works...

__________ _____ __ _ _
Joseph Pehrson

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul H. Erlich <PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM>

> >I'm not sure if what I like about JI is "sonic excellence"
>
> Really? Honestly? That was not the impression I got from your website,
etc.

I'm not sure what you mean by "sonic excellence". I've heard some pretty
excellent sonics out of 12ET instruments too.

> >so much as
> >conceptual simplicity
>
> ??? you mean like simple ratios? Didn't you place your frets _by ear_?
> Doesn't this speak to the _acoustical_ rather than conceptual simplicity
of
> JI? Any temperament that removes one or more commas seems conceptually
> simpler for a musician than JI.

To me what makes a JI guitar "conceptually simple" is that the tuning and
the acoustics of the vibrating string are the same (more or less- or course
an actual string's vibrational mode is complex). I don't mean "easier to
think in theoretically" since I do not do that when I play. The conceptual
part is in devising the tuning system, after that I cant be bothered to be
analyzing what I'm playing- it takes too much time. If the overtone series
is what is "given" by nature, then to me a tuning system consistent with it
is going to be simpler than one that clashes with it. ETs clash with the
overtone series, making them in my mind more complex, though obviously not
any less useable.

> Dante, 22- and 31-tET are conceptually simple and have plenty of new
colors.
> Would you be open to playing guitars in those tunings, if cost were not an
> issue?

Sure! If I had unlimited $$ Pearson would be kept plenty busy by my orders!
You can't have too many guitars. Although I must say that frets too close to
each other are a pain to play, so I don't know if 31 per octave would be to
my liking. unless a guitar was made with a monster scale length to
compensate.

Dante

Rosati wrote:

> > Dante, 22- and 31-tET are conceptually simple and have plenty of new
> colors.
> > Would you be open to playing guitars in those tunings, if cost were not an
> > issue?
>
> Sure! If I had unlimited $$ Pearson would be kept plenty busy by my orders!
> You can't have too many guitars. Although I must say that frets too close to
> each other are a pain to play, so I don't know if 31 per octave would be to
> my liking. unless a guitar was made with a monster scale length to
> compensate.

Pearson? Maybe you mean Glen Peterson? He doesn't do microtonal gtr.
work anymore.

db

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

----- Original Message -----
From: David Beardsley <xouoxno@virtulink.com>
> Pearson? Maybe you mean Glen Peterson? He doesn't do microtonal gtr.
> work anymore.

Yeah, Peterson. Didn't he do Catler's guitars? I know he disappeared from
the list here but we used to correspond and he seemed so gung ho about
refretting guitars. What made him give it up?

Dante

Rosati wrote:

> From: David Beardsley <xouoxno@virtulink.com>
> > Pearson? Maybe you mean Glen Peterson? He doesn't do microtonal gtr.
> > work anymore.
>
> Yeah, Peterson. Didn't he do Catler's guitars?

Yep. I have one too.

> I know he disappeared from
> the list here but we used to correspond and he seemed so gung ho about
> refretting guitars. What made him give it up?

I think he was discouraged by the amount of work he had to
do to get paid. House, family and so on...

db

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

Dante Rosati wrote,

>To me what makes a JI guitar "conceptually simple" is that the tuning and
>the acoustics of the vibrating string are the same (more or less- or
course
>an actual string's vibrational mode is complex).

Well, your tuning is not a harmonic series (if that's what you meant), it's
more like a diamond.

I don't mean "easier to
think in theoretically" since I do not do that when I play. The conceptual
part is in devising the tuning system, after that I cant be bothered to be
analyzing what I'm playing- it takes too much time. If the overtone series
is what is "given" by nature, then to me a tuning system consistent with it
is going to be simpler than one that clashes with it.

There are a lot of possible ways of defining what this means . . .

ETs clash with the
overtone series, making them in my mind more complex, though obviously not
any less useable.

If this "conceptual simplicity" corresponds neither to how you think about
the notes when you play or compose, nor to the "sonic excellence" you
perceive.

>Although I must say that frets too close to
>each other are a pain to play, so I don't know if 31 per octave would be to
>my liking. unless a guitar was made with a monster scale length to
>compensate.

Dante, the step of 31-tET is 38.7 cents. Your guitar already has steps of
21.5 cents (10/9 to 9/8 and 9/5 to 16/9), 27.3 cents (9/8 to 8/7 and 7/4 to
16/9), 35.7 cents (8/7 to 7/6 and 12/7 to 7/4), 35.0 cents (7/5 to 10/7),
which are all smaller than 31-tET steps.

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul H. Erlich <PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM>
> >To me what makes a JI guitar "conceptually simple" is that the tuning and
> >the acoustics of the vibrating string are the same (more or less- or
> course
> >an actual string's vibrational mode is complex).
>
> Well, your tuning is not a harmonic series (if that's what you meant),
it's
> more like a diamond.

No, but every interval is found in the harmonic series. Isn't that what JI
is? A plucked string exhibits an harmonic series, and that tone is used to
play in a scale derived from, or at least mappable to, the same harmonic
series. To me this is conceptual simplicity.

> ETs clash with the
> overtone series, making them in my mind more complex, though obviously not
> any less useable.
>
> If this "conceptual simplicity" corresponds neither to how you think about
> the notes when you play or compose, nor to the "sonic excellence" you
> perceive.

Not sure what you're saying here.

>
> Dante, the step of 31-tET is 38.7 cents. Your guitar already has steps of
> 21.5 cents (10/9 to 9/8 and 9/5 to 16/9), 27.3 cents (9/8 to 8/7 and 7/4
to
> 16/9), 35.7 cents (8/7 to 7/6 and 12/7 to 7/4), 35.0 cents (7/5 to 10/7),
> which are all smaller than 31-tET steps.

OK! Ill buy a lotto ticket tonite! :-)

Dante

Whoops, I didn't finish my thought for Dante:

>ETs clash with the
>overtone series, making them in my mind more complex, though obviously not
>any less useable.

If this "conceptual simplicity" corresponds neither to how you think about
the notes when you play or compose, nor to the "sonic excellence" you
perceive, then isn't it irrelevant? There are a lot of "conceptually simple"
systems with this or that justification, but outside of the _sonic_
properties of the system, and the ease with which the system can be
navigated in performance and/or composition, what relevance would such a
justification have to the music?

I wrote,

>> Dante, the step of 31-tET is 38.7 cents. Your guitar already has steps of
>> 21.5 cents (10/9 to 9/8 and 9/5 to 16/9), 27.3 cents (9/8 to 8/7 and 7/4
to
>> 16/9), 35.7 cents (8/7 to 7/6 and 12/7 to 7/4), 35.0 cents (7/5 to 10/7),
>> which are all smaller than 31-tET steps.

Dante wrote,

>OK! Ill buy a lotto ticket tonite! :-)

Dante -- I guess I was hoping for more of a reaction of how much of a pain
it is for you to get in between those frets on your guitar, since you said:

>I must say that frets too close to
>each other are a pain to play

and also because I've been contemplating making a 31-tET guitar my next one
for some time now.

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul H. Erlich <PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM>

> Whoops, I didn't finish my thought for Dante:
>
> >ETs clash with the
> >overtone series, making them in my mind more complex, though obviously
not
> >any less useable.
>
> If this "conceptual simplicity" corresponds neither to how you think about
> the notes when you play or compose, nor to the "sonic excellence" you
> perceive, then isn't it irrelevant? There are a lot of "conceptually
simple"
> systems with this or that justification, but outside of the _sonic_
> properties of the system, and the ease with which the system can be
> navigated in performance and/or composition, what relevance would such a
> justification have to the music?

It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling when I think about it. :-)

Dante

----- Original Message -----
From: Paul H. Erlich <PERLICH@ACADIAN-ASSET.COM>
> Dante -- I guess I was hoping for more of a reaction of how much of a pain
> it is for you to get in between those frets on your guitar, since you
said:
>
> >I must say that frets too close to
> >each other are a pain to play
>
> and also because I've been contemplating making a 31-tET guitar my next
one
> for some time now.

On my guitar there are some frets that are nice and wide and a few, that you
mentioned, that are obnoxiously close together. While none are impossible to
play, getting a nice clear sound out of the narrow frets is tricky. Since I
compose mostly by improvising, I have to admit that my tendency is to use
the wider frets more often and avoid the narrow ones. The one piece that I
wrote using a predetermined scale (Archytas enharmonic- hopfully soon to be
an mp3 file) requires using many narrow frets and there I just had to get
used to it. So they're not impossible, just a pain in the butt. Also it
might be less of an issue on an electric guitar? where the metal strings
make it easier to get a clear sound?

Dante

>Also it
>might be less of an issue on an electric guitar? where the metal strings
>make it easier to get a clear sound?

I don't know about that -- though if true, that would apply to steel-string
acoustic as well, which is kind of what I'm thinking right now. Anyway, I
find that on my 22-tET electric, I can even get clear sounds out of the 44th
fret if I angle the callous on my finger just right. But I'd be surprised if
that would change if nylon strings were being used.

Joseph said:

"As far as I personally am concerned, though, I enjoy any "distortions" of
the classics if they lead to new perceptions and new understandings of the
works..."

Allow me to register my disagreement here. As a performer earnestly
attempting to get into the head of a composer from a bygone era, it is
crucial to an interpretation that the intonatinon be that imagined by the
composer.

Granted, we have modern ears (and imaginations, and tolerances), but it does
not negate what the appropriate tuning offers the music. Just as 12-TET
music is heard best in 12-TET, so each composer will achieve something that
is inherent in its specific aesthetic.

Specifically, tempi change based on a tuning, as well as ornaments, vibrato
useage and size, accents and other more subtle emphahses, and perhaps more
(like timbral color).

It is simply too easy for ignorance to light the way.

Johnny Reinhard

--- In tuning@egroups.com, Afmmjr@a... wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14599

> Joseph said:
>
> "As far as I personally am concerned, though, I enjoy any
"distortions" of the classics if they lead to new perceptions and
new understandings of the works..."
>
> Allow me to register my disagreement here. As a performer earnestly
> attempting to get into the head of a composer from a bygone era, it
is crucial to an interpretation that the intonatinon be that imagined
by the composer.
>

Hi Johnny!

I don't believe I was suggesting that such experiments be "billed" as
definitive renditions of historical works for public consumption,
only as "personal" experiments such as John deLaubenfels has been
doing...

JP

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "M. Edward Borasky" <znmeb@t...> wrote:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14557
>
> Folksingers often use different guitar tunings. The so-called
> "open" tunings, where all six strings are part of a chord, are
> very popular. Given a guitar tuned to an open just chord and
> fretted with semitone steps, as one moved up the frets with a
> barre, one would play a chromatic scale of just chords, right? :-)

All the vertical intervals of each individual chord would be in
JI, yes, but the 'root-movement' would still be grounded in 12-tET.

(I'm assuming that 'fretted with semitone steps' means the
usual 12-tET guitar fretting.)

This is precisely the kind of 'warping' Paul was talking about.

In order to acheive true JI melodic or 'root' movement on a fretted
instrument with strings tuned to anything other than unisons or
'8ves', one must use staggered frets.

The only guitars I've seen that come close to real JI while still
using straight frets across all six strings, are the guitars
refretted by Robin Perry which he calls 'just-about intonation'.

One guitar Robin lent me has 3 different fret distances: 70, 85,
and 115 cents. On any given string, this produces scale-steps
that give close approximations to such ratios as 10/9, 7/6, etc.

-monz
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html

Monz wrote,

>This is precisely the kind of 'warping' Paul was talking about.

Dante referred to it as "warped" -- I never would.

>In order to acheive true JI melodic or 'root' movement

Why would you want to? Remember how your own "Invisible Haircut" manages to
evoke a V-I root movement even though the actual interval is over 30 cents
off a just fifth?

>The only guitars I've seen that come close to real JI while still
>using straight frets across all six strings, are the guitars
>refretted by Robin Perry which he calls 'just-about intonation'.

>One guitar Robin lent me has 3 different fret distances: 70, 85,
>and 115 cents. On any given string, this produces scale-steps
>that give close approximations to such ratios as 10/9, 7/6, etc.

How does Robin tune his open strings?

[Joseph Pehrson:]
>>As far as I personally am concerned, though, I enjoy any "distortions"
>>of the classics if they lead to new perceptions and new understandings
>>of the works...

[Johnny Reinhard:]
>Allow me to register my disagreement here. As a performer earnestly
>attempting to get into the head of a composer from a bygone era, it is
>crucial to an interpretation that the intonatinon be that imagined by
>the composer.

And hooray for your efforts! Does the fact that this is your very
helpful focus negate other interpretations? Must there be one "winner"
rather than a multiplicity of offshoots?

[Johnny:]
>Granted, we have modern ears (and imaginations, and tolerances), but it
>does not negate what the appropriate tuning offers the music. Just as
>12-TET music is heard best in 12-TET, so each composer will achieve
>something that is inherent in its specific aesthetic.

Again the absolute expression. And the word "appropriate". I would
much rather hear of "beauty", good or bad.

[Johnny:]
>It is simply too easy for ignorance to light the way.

Would you please explain what you mean by this?

JdL

Monz wrote:

> In order to acheive true JI melodic or 'root' movement on a fretted
> instrument with strings tuned to anything other than unisons or
> '8ves', one must use staggered frets.
>
> The only guitars I've seen that come close to real JI while still
> using straight frets across all six strings, are the guitars
> refretted by Robin Perry which he calls 'just-about intonation'.

You worded that tricky. I almost thought you wrote
that one can't have JI with frets straight across the neck.
Rod Poole produces amazing music in JI with a guitar
fretted with straight frets.

db

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

David Bearsley wrote,

>Rod Poole produces amazing music in JI with a guitar
>fretted with straight frets.

So does Dante Rosati. But I think Monz has something a little more flexible
in mind.

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "John A. deLaubenfels" <jdl@a...> wrote:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14569
>
> It is an interesting challenge to try to sort out the cases
> in which a composer (long dead) was deliberately making use of
> the characteristics of a particular tuning, rather than making
> do with a known compromise.

I think Webern is a perfect example of this.

I've done some work on a MIDI-file of Webern's _Piano Variations_
in connection with a notational anomaly I noticed in the score
of that piece: the first movement is written entirely in 3/8
time, while the meters implied by the music change all over the
place. I used the results of my analysis of the actual meters
in my choice of tempi, and especially the _rubato_:

http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/webern/webern.htm

On that page, I argue that Webern's music has a built-in
expressivity that is rarely encountered in performance, and
which I'm trying to bring out here. I mention how I'd like to
alter other aspects besides tempo to enhance this effect, and
tuning would certainly be one of them.

But try as I might, I just can't think of any way to retune this
piece! Every time I make the attempt, I come away with the
feeling that Webern was milking 12-tET for everything he could
get out of it, and so the piece must stand in that tuning.

I've brought up the point here many times in the past that Webern
and other followers of Schoenberg:

- did believe that the harmonic series provides some kind of
paradigm for musical harmony,

- did believe that non-12-tET tunings could be used to good effect,
and

- did accept 12-tET after all, mainly for practical reasons.

Webern did discuss quarter-tones in his book _The Path to the New
Music_, and did indicate non-12-tET pitches in one of his early
songs, so I suppose that even in his case 12-tET must be considered
a 'known compromise'. But, more so than Schoenberg, Berg, or
any of the others, he seems to have fully embraced it and all of
its implications, and sought to make use of its limitations
in his compositional techniques.

-monz
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html

I wrote,

>So does Dante Rosati.

Oops -- his frets are not quite straight across, because they are placed (by
ear, with amazing accuracy) to compensate for the typical intonation
problems of a classical guitar with a straight nut and bridge.

Dante wrote,

>It gives me a warm fuzzy feeling when I think about it. :-)

That's amazing . . . in my message, I originally wrote, "is it just for the
warm fuzzy feeling it gives you when you think about it", and then I deleted
that. Well, good to know we're on the same "wavelength".

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Paul H. Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14595
>
> Dante -- I guess I was hoping for more of a reaction of how much
> of a pain it is for you to get in between those frets on your
> guitar, since you said:
>
> > I must say that frets too close to
> > each other are a pain to play
>
> and also because I've been contemplating making a 31-tET guitar
> my next one for some time now.

Hey Dante and Paul, I just thought I'd toss this in since I have
been playing around with one of Ivor's 31-tET guitars lately.

At first, it was very difficult to navigate because of the small
fret distances. But I find that the more I play it, the easier
it gets. (And note my usual disclaimer: I am *not* a guitarist!)

I still can't get my fingers to do much beyond the 12th fret,
which gives the approximation to the '4th' (and the pitches for
four of the strings in the 'normal' A-E-D-G-B-E tuning).

But working below that fret-limit, there are lots and lots of
new chords and scales to be found!

I hope to get a fretboard diagram of this guitar up on my site soon.

-monz
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html

Rosati wrote:

> On my guitar there are some frets that are nice and wide and a few, that you
> mentioned, that are obnoxiously close together. While none are impossible to
> play, getting a nice clear sound out of the narrow frets is tricky. Since I
> compose mostly by improvising, I have to admit that my tendency is to use
> the wider frets more often and avoid the narrow ones.

Me too. ;)

> The one piece that I
> wrote using a predetermined scale (Archytas enharmonic- hopfully soon to be
> an mp3 file) requires using many narrow frets and there I just had to get
> used to it. So they're not impossible, just a pain in the butt. Also it
> might be less of an issue on an electric guitar? where the metal strings
> make it easier to get a clear sound?

It doesn't seem to be a problem for Jon Catler. I have a bit of a
problem
with the narrow frets, but there are a few tight frets I've gotten used
to.
He has a technique of just laying a finger behind a higher fret that
works.
You don't have to push down and the note just sounds. I should note
that we have jumbo size frets on these guitars.

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

In a message dated 10/18/00 6:04:53 PM Eastern Daylight Time,
jdl@adaptune.com writes:

> And hooray for your efforts! Does the fact that this is your very
> helpful focus negate other interpretations? Must there be one "winner"
> rather than a multiplicity of offshoots?

Just as we could use modern genetics to mix just about everything (e.g.,
tomato with a frog) there are restraints. Moving to far away from nature
distorts things about the integrity of a phenomenon which we cannot always be
prepared for. Sure, anyone can research or create anything. If a composer
could be specifically tied to a single tuning, then that tuning is the
"winner" as far as I am concerned.

> [Johnny:]
> >Granted, we have modern ears (and imaginations, and tolerances), but it
> >does not negate what the appropriate tuning offers the music. Just as
> >12-TET music is heard best in 12-TET, so each composer will achieve
> >something that is inherent in its specific aesthetic.
>
> Again the absolute expression. And the word "appropriate". I would
> much rather hear of "beauty", good or bad.

I am not writing for your rathers. I began this as a stated disagreement.
Beauty is in the ears of the beholder. "Appropriate" is taken to be the
specific tuning in a sea of generalities.

> [Johnny:]
> >It is simply too easy for ignorance to light the way.
>
> Would you please explain what you mean by this?

Not knowing something is not the same as never knowing. Ignorance of a
composer's preferred tuning does not give license to willy-nilly use anything
you want when you are truly representing a composer's music in concert.

John, I have no difficulty with your view and your expressions (though I must
admit I haven't had the opportunity to hear your musical examples...people
seem to love it.) My only beef is with the necessary honesty of presenting
composer's as ideally as possible. The concept of "beauty" is only relative,
while cultural context is integral to any music, way beyond tuning itself.

Johnny Reinhard

--- In tuning@egroups.com, " Monz" <MONZ@J...> wrote:

http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14615

Congratulations, Joe, on your recent work with the Webern Piano
Variations... I believe Webern is VERY much "on topic" for this
list, since we recently were considering rhythmic ratios, and
rhythmic constructs that were related to just intonation PITCH
ratios, only just a "tad" slower :)

I was particularly intrigued by your comments concerning Webern's
relationship to Mahler... something that I had, regrettably, never
thought about. They certainly were in the same camp.

Hmmm. Well maybe "camp" isn't the right word for it...

It seemed to me too, in Weberns Chamber Concerto of 1934... which I
actually tried to conduct for a conducting class and messed up, if I
recall... had VERY arbitrary barlines. The barlines have NOTHING to
do with the music.

I guess the point was to keep the meter simple... the music was SO
new at that time that a constantly changing time sig. would "freak
out" anybody trying to do the works.

However, I think you are right... Webern is after something here that
is NOT congruent with his bar lines... and your version seems to well
take this into account!

Oh. By the way... I can't see your music pages in Netscape. I had
to open my Internet Explorer (Bill Gates would be proud).

I wonder why it works only in Explorer (??)

Anyway, congrats, again and I'm sure we will figure out how Webern
fits into microtonal tuning discussion. If not, I will personally
make something up...

Joe
__________ _____ __ _
Joseph Pehrson

--- In tuning@egroups.com, Afmmjr@a... wrote:

> John, I have no difficulty with your view and your expressions
(though I must
> admit I haven't had the opportunity to hear your musical
examples...people
> seem to love it.) My only beef is with the necessary honesty of
presenting
> composer's as ideally as possible. The concept of "beauty" is only
relative,
> while cultural context is integral to any music, way beyond tuning
itself.

Johnny, I do wish you would listen to John's examples. I personally
worked pretty hard to
get John to listen to and accomodate my views about what is and is
not appropriate for
various composers. Although we have just begun along this path, I
truly believe that
many of the examples John has produced are both faithful to the
composer's intentions,
and ideal in terms of the tradeoff of harmonic and melodic
considerations. Think of it as
the way a wind, brass, or string ensemble would perform the piece if
they had
superhuman pitch control and sensitivity to prior and future events
in the score.

The idea of adaptive tuning goes back to Vicentino in 1555, who
proposed the two chains
of 1/4-comma meantone tuning a pure fifth (or equivalently, a pure
minor third, or 1/4
comma) apart. This proposal would never compromise the melodic
integrity of the chain
of identical (in this case, meantone) fifths by more than a
melodically inaudible interval,
1/4-comma, while attaining perfect vertical JI in all triads. To me,
this amounts to audibly
"perfect" tuning within the Renaissance theoretical ideal (as
expressed by, say, Zarlino),
and much of the subsequent repertoire well into the 18th century --
until enharmonic
equivalents began to be used. Though Vicentino's two-keyboard
implementation was not
practical at the time, with computers (or, perhaps, AFMM performers),
we can acheive
his goals, and even surpass him in cases where his proposal runs into
difficulties.

I would add a belated comment to John deLaubenfels -- in cases where
a late 15th
through early 18th century piece has more than 12 notated pitches,
his program still
leaves something to be desired relative to Vicentino's method -- as,
if I recall correctly,
he touched upon when considering 13-pitch schemes (John, what exactly
did you look at
as regards 13 notated pitches -- is it obsolete now)?

[Johnny Reinhard:]
>>>Granted, we have modern ears (and imaginations, and tolerances), but
>>>it does not negate what the appropriate tuning offers the music. Just
>>>as 12-TET music is heard best in 12-TET, so each composer will
>>>achieve something that is inherent in its specific aesthetic.

[JdL:]
>>Again the absolute expression. And the word "appropriate". I would
>>much rather hear of "beauty", good or bad.

[Johnny:]
>I am not writing for your rathers.

Fair enough. Isn't the beauty of music the bottom line for you, though?
I know it is for me!

[Johnny:]
>Beauty is in the ears of the beholder.

Exactly, and that is precisely why a multiplicity of interpretations is
a good thing, so that as many people as possible can achieve maximum
enjoyment of the beauty of music.

[Johnny:]
>Ignorance of a composer's preferred tuning does not give license to
>willy-nilly use anything you want when you are truly representing a
>composer's music in concert.

I think you are completely missing the point. First, of course I agree
that knowledge is better than ignorance. And of course I agree that it
would be wrong to claim to be "truly representing a composer's music
in concert" if I'm knowingly modifying it. But every one of us holds
a "license" to interpret past works freely. Consider the many
re-interpretations of Beatles songs, for example: many of them distort
the rhythm, the harmony, the instrumentation, and the vocal style of the
originals. Are they better, more beautiful? That's in the ear of the
beholder. Is the world a richer place musically because of them?
Absolutely, in my book! The ones I don't like, I skip. I think it
would be very silly to lecture the artists who cover these songs that
what they're doing is "not appropriate."

[Johnny:]
>My only beef is with the necessary honesty of presenting composer's as
>ideally as possible.

I'm all in favor of honesty. That is a straw issue, IMHO. Or are you
saying that any reworking of any existing piece is ipso facto
"dishonest"?

[Johnny:]
>The concept of "beauty" is only relative,

"Only." To me, it the heart of music, the reason to take the trouble
to make it. The fact that different people have different tastes is
something to be celebrated. I would like there to be as many variants
of a lovely work as are necessary to satisfy the ears of the greatest
number of people.

JdL

[Paul E:]
>I would add a belated comment to John deLaubenfels -- in cases where
>a late 15th through early 18th century piece has more than 12 notated
>pitches, his program still leaves something to be desired relative to
>Vicentino's method -- as, if I recall correctly, he touched upon when
>considering 13-pitch schemes (John, what exactly did you look at
>as regards 13 notated pitches -- is it obsolete now)?

Not obsolete, just incomplete. Sorry. It's on my list, along with a
host of other things. Like you, I'm interested in hearing the results
of this refinement! I really have no idea if I'll think it makes the
tuning better.

JdL

Monz wrote:

> In order to acheive true JI melodic or 'root' movement on a fretted
> instrument with strings tuned to anything other than unisons or
> '8ves', one must use staggered frets.
>
> The only guitars I've seen that come close to real JI while still
> using straight frets across all six strings, are the guitars
> refretted by Robin Perry which he calls 'just-about intonation'.

Out of 65 frets on my JI guitar, 27 of the frets are straight
across the neck. AND it's open strings are tuned VERY close
to 12tet.

db

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Paul H. Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14607
>
> Monz wrote,
>
> > This is precisely the kind of 'warping' Paul was talking about.
>
> Dante referred to it as "warped" -- I never would.

I was referring to this statement you made, Paul:

> Paul Erlich wrote:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/14519
>
> Bob Dylan's guitar on his own recordings was often tuned so
> that the tonic chord was closer to JI, and then the other chords
> would of course be warped due to the 12-tET frets. I don't know
> about classification, but this certainly could be quantified.

[back to message 14607]

>
> > In order to acheive true JI melodic or 'root' movement
>
> Why would you want to? Remember how your own "Invisible Haircut"
> manages to evoke a V-I root movement even though the actual
> interval is over 30 cents off a just fifth?

Well... *I* wouldn't necessarily want to! :)

But someone else might... say, followers of Partch's theory,
for instance.

(And thanks for plugging my tune!... especially since you're
complimenting me on my harmonic 'sleight of hand', which I myself
am particularly proud of in that piece.)

>
> > The only guitars I've seen that come close to real JI while still
> > using straight frets across all six strings, are the guitars
> > refretted by Robin Perry which he calls 'just-about intonation'.
>
> > One guitar Robin lent me has 3 different fret distances: 70, 85,
> > and 115 cents. On any given string, this produces scale-steps
> > that give close approximations to such ratios as 10/9, 7/6, etc.
>
> How does Robin tune his open strings?

To be honest, I'll have to write him and ask... too bad he's not
on the List anymore. As a general rule, he tunes the open strings
to a JI (or pseudo-JI) chord, but of course any tuning at all can
be used for the open strings, including one that more closely
resembles the 'regular' tuning.

I wrote a very brief description of this guitar 7 months ago,
right after visiting Robin during my road trip west:

> me, monz:
> http://www.egroups.com/message/tuning/8889
>
> It has 3 different sizes of frets which go straight across
> the neck: 70 cents, 85 cents, and 115 cents, in this repeating
> pattern:
>
> || | | | | | | |
> || 70 | 115 | 85 | 115 | 115 | 85 | 115 |
> || | | | | | | |
>
> Most of you should be able to see right away some
> of the just ratios that it approximates well. The tuning of the
> open strings is completely 'user-definable', but Robin generally
> uses tunings which produce a nice rich JI chord on the open strings.

To the best of my recollection, he tuned this particular 'Jinto'
guitar to a pseudo-JI 'major 9th' chord, giving the following
fretboard tuning for the first 14 frets (in Semitones):

open str: 0.00 3.85 7.00 10.85 12+2.00 12+5.85

0.70 0.70 4.55 7.70 11.55 12+ 2.70 12+ 6.55
1.15 1.85 5.70 8.85 12+ 0.70 12+ 3.85 12+ 7.70
0.85 2.70 6.55 9.70 12+ 1.55 12+ 4.70 12+ 8.55
1.15 3.85 7.70 10.85 12+ 2.70 12+ 5.85 12+ 9.70
1.15 5.00 8.85 12+ 0.00 12+ 3.85 12+ 7.00 12+10.85
0.85 5.85 9.70 12+ 0.85 12+ 4.70 12+ 7.85 12+11.70
1.15 7.00 10.85 12+ 2.00 12+ 5.85 12+ 9.00 24+ 0.85
0.70 7.70 11.55 12+ 2.70 12+ 6.55 12+ 9.70 24+ 1.55
1.15 8.85 12+ 0.70 12+ 3.85 12+ 7.70 12+10.85 24+ 2.70
0.85 9.70 12+ 1.55 12+ 4.70 12+ 8.55 12+11.70 24+ 3.55
1.15 10.85 12+ 2.70 12+ 5.85 12+ 9.70 24+ 0.85 24+ 4.70
1.15 12+ 0.00 12+ 3.85 12+ 7.00 12+10.85 24+ 2.00 24+ 5.85
0.85 12+ 0.85 12+ 4.70 12+ 7.85 12+11.70 24+ 2.85 24+ 6.70
1.15 12+ 2.00 12+ 5.85 12+ 9.00 24+ 0.85 24+ 4.00 24+ 7.85

If one *were* to try to tune the open strings to the 'regular'
tuning strictly according the notes available on the fretboard,
however, there would be a discrepancy of approximately a comma
on the higher strings, as I illustrate here with a diagram
giving the first 5 frets:

open: 0.00 5.00 10.00 12+ 3.00 12+ 6.85 12+11.85

0.70 0.70 5.70 10.70 12+ 3.70 12+ 7.55 24+ 0.55
1.15 1.85 6.85 11.85 12+ 4.85 12+ 8.70 24+ 1.70
0.85 2.70 7.70 12+ 0.70 12+ 5.70 12+ 9.55 24+ 2.55
1.15 3.85 8.85 12+ 1.85 12+ 6.85 12+ 10.70 24+ 3.70
1.15 5.00 10.00 12+ 3.00 12+ 8.00 12+ 11.85 24+ 4.85

Tuning the 5th string to 12+6.85 Semitones gives a 'B' which
is darn close to the 5/4 above the 'G'-string, but it's also
~17 cents flatter than the 'B' which would be an '8ve'+ 3/2
above the 'low E'-string, and the frets on that 'B' string
give a 'high-E' which is also ~15 cents flat in relation to
the 'low-E'.

One could certainly tune the open strings to a 'regular'
tuning where the 'B' is sharper than what the fretboard
gives, and also tune the 'high-E' string an exact 2 '8ves'
above the 'low-E', but then you end up with notes that
are unrelated to those on the fretboard (which might not
necessarily be a problem...).

My guess is that Robin decided on using JI-chord open tunings
at least partly to avoid this kind of thing.

I haven't really devoted much time to studying what this guitar
can do, and others guitar players who I've shown it to have been
baffled. I hope to eventually make a webpage about it after I've
played it more.

-monz
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html

David Beardsley wrote,

>Out of 65 frets on my JI guitar, 27 of the frets are straight
>across the neck. AND it's open strings are tuned VERY close
>to 12tet.

I thought Catler's tuning had a 27:20 between the D and G strings. Has this
changed?

Monz wrote,

>>> This is precisely the kind of 'warping' Paul was talking about.

I wrote,

>> Dante referred to it as "warped" -- I never would.

Monz wrote,

>I was referring to this statement you made, Paul:

>> Bob Dylan's guitar on his own recordings was often tuned so
>> that the tonic chord was closer to JI, and then the other chords
>> would of course be warped due to the 12-tET frets. I don't know
>> about classification, but this certainly could be quantified.

oh -- but you were talking about non-JI root movement, which is not at all
what I referred to as warped. I referred to chords that deviated from 12-tET
in directions _away_ from JI as warped.

>Well... *I* wouldn't necessarily want to! :)

>But someone else might... say, followers of Partch's theory,
>for instance.

>(And thanks for plugging my tune!... especially since you're
>complimenting me on my harmonic 'sleight of hand', which I myself
>am particularly proud of in that piece.)

Well, I think it just points to shortcomings in certain interpretations of
Partch's theory -- however "warm and fuzzy" it may make you feel.

I'll have to look at Robin Perry's guitar thing later.

"Paul H. Erlich" wrote:

> Well, I think it just points to shortcomings in certain interpretations of
> Partch's theory -- however "warm and fuzzy" it may make you feel.

Since much perception is memory feed back enables you to fool the ear from time to time
doesn't quality as pointing out shortcomings. Music Pelog is heard as within a cycle of 12
fifths when it is actually a 9 doesn't point out the short comings but anything than the
tolerances ET systems tend to promote . Such slight differences in tuning have not become that
meaningful an expression-yet!

>
>
> I'll have to look at Robin Perry's guitar thing later.

-- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria island
www.anaphoria.com

I wrote,

>> Well, I think it just points to shortcomings in certain interpretations
of
>> Partch's theory -- however "warm and fuzzy" it may make you feel.

Kraig wrote,

>Since much perception is memory feed back enables you to fool the ear from
time to time
>doesn't quality as pointing out shortcomings.

If I interpret you correctly, then triadic diatonic music since the
Renaissance _depends_ on "fooling the ear from time to time" and the
Partch/Doty school does not seem to recognize this -- but Vicentino did in
1555.

>Music Pelog is heard as within a cycle of 12
>fifths when it is actually a 9 doesn't point out the short comings but
anything than the
>tolerances ET systems tend to promote .

I agree but don't see the relevance of this to our discussion -- a cycle of
anything is even further removed from JI than anything I'm talking about.

Paul!
I guess my point is we are so used to hearing out of tune intervals that we place them
where they belong. Now if i have a 88 degree angle most people will see it as 90 unless
pointed out to them . But if we start to use 88 degree angles to do something significant , we
will learn to perceive it. Maybe in 50 years people will recognize Monz interval as something
else.

"Paul H. Erlich" wrote:

> >Music Pelog is heard as within a cycle of 12
> >fifths when it is actually a 9 doesn't point out the short comings but
> anything than the
> >tolerances ET systems tend to promote .
>
> I agree but don't see the relevance of this to our discussion -- a cycle of
> anything is even further removed from JI than anything I'm talking about.

-- Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria island
www.anaphoria.com

Is there any way to contact Robin Perry and find out exactly how he tunes
the open strings of his guitar, and what chords he plays on it?

"Paul H. Erlich" wrote:
>
> David Beardsley wrote,
>
> >Out of 65 frets on my JI guitar, 27 of the frets are straight
> >across the neck. AND it's open strings are tuned VERY close
> >to 12tet.
>
> I thought Catler's tuning had a 27:20 between the D and G strings. Has this
> changed?

No.

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

Beauty in music is but one component. It is not the bottom line as it has
been put. I'm not sure this is the medium for getting my aesthetics across,
but will be happy to try.

There is philosophy in music that is very important to me. This is a
transmission of specific and particular points of view which communicate to
me, giving me greater perspective.

There is the painting of creation, the depiction of our realities in all its
variation, as seen by sensitive and perceptive aural wizards. Often these
realizations are not pretty in any classic sense.

Noise is a big part of today's music, whether it be pop, rap, or
multiphonics. I have learned to apprehend them as a form of beauty not
usually accepted as such by most listeners. Still, they are most exquisitely
beautiful to me, only not in the usual meaning of the word as usually
interpreted.

Real beauty for me would be to hear J.S. Bach in Werckmeister III as a
reference tuning. This is already a kaleidoscopic tuning, with each key in
its own tuning. I'm not interested in curtailing the freedoms of any
particular musician to play with different tunings in any ways imaginable.
But it's challenging enough to "try" to hear the way Bach heard that I don't
want to be distracted from the clear road in that direction. This is very
personal stuff for me.

I hope I have helped to make my aesthetic clearer. It comes down to a gut
feeling on my part. I don't trust an absolute "beauty."

Johnny Reinhard