Re: Thai "7-equal" tuning (was Re: Brian McLaren's "Introduction to Microtonality" take aways...)

Hi Kraig:

> Pythagorean tunings do exist on many string instruments in Japan,
> China Vietnam. The tuning is done by fourths and fifth not by
> successive scale steps all with the goal to make the former
> interval beatless. The scale I have seen referred to as 7 ET
> or ET appears in all the cent measurements I have seen to be consistently not ET at all

Do you have measurements for the Thai "7-equal" scale to hand?

I've got it in FTS, for the three Thai modes in the Scala modoes list,
but use 7-tet as a first approximation, as I didn't know what cent values to use.

I expect it varies as the Slendro Gamelan tunings vary, but would be nice
to use a genuine tuning, just one example, as I do for Slendro.

I've looked in the Scala archives, but I don't htink there are any
measurements for Thai 7 equal in it yet. I've been keeping
an eye out for one for some time.

Robert

--- In tuning@y..., "Robert Walker" <robertwalker@n...> wrote:
> Hi Kraig:
>
> > Pythagorean tunings do exist on many string instruments in Japan,
> > China Vietnam. The tuning is done by fourths and fifth not by
> > successive scale steps all with the goal to make the former
> > interval beatless. The scale I have seen referred to as 7 ET
> > or ET appears in all the cent measurements I have seen to be
consistently not ET at all
>
> Do you have measurements for the Thai "7-equal" scale to hand?
>
> I've got it in FTS, for the three Thai modes in the Scala modoes
list,
> but use 7-tet as a first approximation, as I didn't know what cent
values to use.
>
> I expect it varies as the Slendro Gamelan tunings vary, but would
be nice
> to use a genuine tuning, just one example, as I do for Slendro.
>
> I've looked in the Scala archives, but I don't htink there are any
> measurements for Thai 7 equal in it yet. I've been keeping
> an eye out for one for some time.
>
The Thai scale is _conceptually_ equal. Thai musicians accept do
accept 7-tET, but they also accept modest deviations from it, which
usually come up in practice since ETs are very hard to tune by ear,
especially on instruments such as the Thai xylophones, etc.

By contrast, a study of Central African musicians employing 5-tone
scales showed that, while they felt 5-tET was OK, they preferred
somewhat unequal tunings.