Re: Calling all British Microtonalists

Hi Johnny,

Sounds great!

I'd also be especially interested to meet you to
swap notes on microtonal recorder techniques!

Robert

Hi Monz,

I wonder if there is a possiblity of you joining
forces if it happened to synchronise with your visit
to Europe for your paper?

Maybe something to bear in mind to make the first get together
synchronise with your visit if that was possible!

Robert

Hi Johnny,

Sounds great!

I'd be especially interested to meet you to swap notes on
microtonal recorder techniques!

Robert

Hi Johnny,

Would be great to hear a performance of microtonal
recorder music!

What do your eight players play by way of instruments?

N.B. I don't know if you saw the thing I said to Alison
about the Bates collection of historical musical instruments
here in Oxford. They have some early bassoon
type instruments as well, may interest you if one of
the venues was Oxford at a later date, as it
is a working library, and instruments can be borrowed,
I've heard.

Robert

Hi Alison,

> I'll send you a tape of some music certainly. I would like to encourage this,

Would be great to hear what you are doing.

> I could offer to play my 22 tet guitar pieces. For other pieces the instruments

That would be good. Will be nice to see and hear some real acoustic microtonal
instruments, and ones designed to play microtonal scales.

> would need to be
> built or modified and players/singers trained but till that happens good
> sampler/midi realisations
> would be a start. That's a starting point for collaborations.

Have to start somewhere.

> The educational angle is a strong one in Scotland and I think it would be most
> beneficial for
> schools and university composition departments to have visiting
> speakers/demonstrators show some
> of the possibilities of non-12 music. First some sort of profile would have to
> be established, to
> get the credibility in the first place. I've just read Graham's suggestions

Yes I think sort of thing would appeal to a school,
esp. if it could somehow be tied in with the curriculum.

Add a bit of an outside interest, always a help to teachers, not just
the same people and approaches all the time.

> I'm in Jedburgh in the Borders so that's useful to know.

My sister in the borders lives at Kirk Yetholm.

School connections - she and her husband are both teachers,
primary, and secondary school computing dept. resp.

I could mention ideas and see if either have any
thoughts - no direct connection with the music depts
(though both are musical), but would of course know
other teachers in their schools, and in the area.

> I agree, even if it's an anorak's convention (for the US readers, anorak =
> nerdy geeky sort of
> person). I think we have to think small given the numbers. I'm still counting
> on one hand.

I wonder, even a primary school would be a possibility
for a venue for a small group. Yes, I don't think more than one hand yet,...
Getting there.

> performances. Another
> option would be to build a UK microtonal site and keep it alive with streamed
> audio, scores and
> theoretical issues. If it was publicised around the right places it should
> arouses some interest.
....
> It strikes me that the theorists are way ahead of the game and that a well
> presented paper on the
> Miracle and related tunings with electronic or midi pieces would be a sound
> start. This could be
> done in a reasonably short time span given sympathetic music institutions.
> Perhaps if a UK
> microtonal website was up and running concurrently, interest would grow and
> we'd get the critical
> mass for an event.

Yes, and I imagine a nice web site could help with "respectability".

> I'm considering approaching Edinburgh University formally but it needs to be
> done carefully. They
...

Sounds like you have a few possibilities in Edinburgh.

> get the credibility in the first place. I've just read Graham's suggestions
> and, though it breaks
> my heart to say it, I agree that England is probably a more suitable focal
> point than Edinburgh
> for now. For a start as far as I know the current microtonal population of
> Scotland is 1.

I suppose so, especially if we have a few visitors from Europe too at some
point, you never know...

However, I'd have thought varying the venue would be nice, and if there
is one microtonalist in Scotland, that's enough reason to have one there
given the numbers involved!

Maybe you'll find more.

> for heads of music departments would be useful with a going rate fee. If the
> findings are to make
> any impression in the academic journals, one could tempt departments by
> offering them the chance
> to say, "you heard about it here first".

Could be.

If one finds an academic at a university who is really interested in some
microtonal angle, and who teaches there, my experience is
an interested academic can get things arranged and make things happen,
one way or another. May we find microtonal friends in unexpected
places!

Robert