7-limit Gershwin (was: counterpoint)

[Graham wrote:]
>I don't know about Gershwin's ideas, but his music seems to work with
>12-equal. John deLaubenfels did a 7-limit retuning of Rhapsody in
>Blue. I don't remember if he made it public. It sounds good after a
>while, with all the clean chords, but not what I think Gershwin would
>have expected. Although for all we know the same could be true of
>those pure renditions of Palestrina.

While it is of course true that any of my tunings, especially the
7-limit ones, might not be what the original composer would have
expected, I seem to hear you suggesting that 7-limit renditions of
Gershwin are less suited to the music than 7-limit renditions of other
composers. This is definitely not my own impression.

I did post tunings of a lovely 2-hand piano reduction of Rhapsody in
Blue (supposedly Gershwin's own reduction), which are not currently on
my web site. There should still be an MP3 file of that piece in
7-limit on the Tuning Punks page, however.

JdL

To my ear and understanding, Porgy and Bess must be sung to Blues tradition tuning. Straight 12-tET is not right at all for this Gershwin classic, at least in the vocals.

Johnny Reinhard

"Summertime in 12-tET?" nah.

Gershwin's expectations? He, too, may have liked a pleasant surprise
now and then. If you can access a copy of an old (probably '50's)
Red Seal recording of "Porgy and Bess", listen to that strawberry
woman. This recording has it! And whatever the notation (and its
expected rendition), I'm quite sure this is what GG wanted to
emulate.

klaus

"John A. deLaubenfels" schrieb:
>
> [Graham wrote:]
> >I don't know about Gershwin's ideas, but his music seems to work with
> >12-equal. John deLaubenfels did a 7-limit retuning of Rhapsody in
> >Blue. I don't remember if he made it public. It sounds good after a
> >while, with all the clean chords, but not what I think Gershwin would
> >have expected. Although for all we know the same could be true of
> >those pure renditions of Palestrina.
>
> While it is of course true that any of my tunings, especially the
> 7-limit ones, might not be what the original composer would have
> expected, I seem to hear you suggesting that 7-limit renditions of
> Gershwin are less suited to the music than 7-limit renditions of other
> composers. This is definitely not my own impression.
>
> I did post tunings of a lovely 2-hand piano reduction of Rhapsody in
> Blue (supposedly Gershwin's own reduction), which are not currently on
> my web site. There should still be an MP3 file of that piece in
> 7-limit on the Tuning Punks page, however.
>
> JdL

Johnny Reinhard wrote:

<To my ear and understanding, Porgy and Bess must be sung to Blues tradition
tuning. Straight 12-tET is not right at all for this Gershwin classic, at least
in the vocals.>

<"Summertime in 12-tET?" nah.>

I have heard John's de Laubenfels [excuse spelling] Gershwin renditions and
although the harmonies sound wonderfull the melodies don't quite sound correct
[although they are still very beautiful].

I have been reading Boomsliter and Creels report on extended reference tuning
for melodies. The examples I have tried out sound very convincing.

Justin White

DAVID JONES LIMITED ACN 000 074 573

Hi Justin,

I wasn't sure exactly the connection you were making. It may be related to
the feeling I have playing Blues to a JI guitar rather than to a 12-tET
guitar. The semantics of bending is different. I prefer playing Blues
against a 12-tET for all its many references. The JI references seem
otherworldly is contrast.

Johnny Reinhard

Johnny Reinhard wrote

>Hi Justin,

>I wasn't sure exactly the connection you were making. It may be related >to
>the feeling I have playing Blues to a JI guitar rather than to a 12-tET
>guitar. The semantics of bending is different. I prefer playing Blues
>against a 12-tET for all its many references. The JI references seem
>otherworldly is contrast.

Oh absolutely septimal JI and higher limits do sound otherworldly but in my
opinion they are superior to 12 tet for blues music.

What I was refering to was a special form of Just Intonation that was devised
through the research of Paul C. Boomsliter and Warren Creel in the 1960's.
They basically realised that there was no comparable theory for melody in
western music as there was for harmony. So they set out to find out what pitches
musicians used for melody.

To begin with they used a sort of monochord with a slide and asked test subjects
to select pitches for a bunch of different melodies. They would always recheck
the subjects choice of pitch showing alternative pitches to make absolutely
certain that this was the pitch the subject found most pleasing.

When they had interpreted the data they found that subjects would neither use
classical just intonation [1/1, 9/8, 5/4, 4/3, 3/2, 5/3, 15/8] nor 12tet nor
pythagorean intonation.They assembled the pitches the subjects used into 3
referential keyboards.

What they found was that subjects chose intonations that were in small whole
number ratios to a unsounded [phantom ?] reference. This reference would change
as the music progressed travelling through a set of linkages. These linkages
fell into 3 categories major, minor and blue. With the major chain of
references there are a succession of 3:2's. The small whole number ratios that
were related to these links are 1/1, 9/8, 7/6, 6/5, 5/4, 4/3, 7/5, 3/2, 8/5,
5/3, 7/4 & 9/5. These ratios are transposed into five tiers based on the
reference of the keyboard.

The minor keyboard is similar to the major keyboard except the second tier is
transposed by 6:5 and then by successive 3:2's. The blue keyboard initially is
transposed by 5:4 and then by a chain of 3:2's.

This keyboard should not be thought of as merely modulations of a set of just
interval as the each tier is NOT treated individually pitches from differnt
ranks are played in succession.

Anyway I have been able to use this method effectively using Justonic's Pitch
Palette software to manually change keys as I am playing to achieve the most
satisfactory intonation for my melodies.

Another untapped area in this regard is the use of 11 and 13 limit ratios in an
extended reference scheme for melody.

Justin White

DAVID JONES LIMITED ACN 000 074 573