the "silent majority"

--- In tuning@y..., "D.Stearns" <STEARNS@C...> wrote:

/tuning/topicId_unknown.html#26209

> The one sure thing that I think has come from the big list breaking
> up, and this is something that I pretty much suspected anyway, is
that the big list was never big. The 450 plus membership and its
promise of an interested but silent contingency was a sham... I doubt
that there's ever more than 25 or 35 active members, with about half
that actually being regular participants.
>
> Let's face it folks, it's a pretty darned microscopic microtonal
> community we have here, well at least as it's represented by the
> online contingency anyway...
>
> --Dan Stearns

I dunno, Dan... this may or may not be an accurate representation of
the "silent majority..."

The lists states that 469 people are subscribed... that's up about
100 since I joined a couple years ago...

Why, if these people aren't interested, do they still SUBSCRIBE??

I'm assuming that most of them get the list via e-mail rather than
Web access. I could understand it if the majority were Web access --
since people could just sign up and forget about it.

But even of the 25-35 "regulars" here... the MAJORITY, so it seems,
still get an e-mail version... Since this seems the case, why
wouldn't it pertain to the others, by extension, as well??

So, if all these people are getting Tuning List e-mail in their in-
boxes, they *must* be at least moderately interested... or they would
UNSUBSCRIBE... rather than fill their in-boxes with more "spam..."
wouldn't they??

Am I missing something??

Thanks!

_________ ______ _______
Joseph Pehrson

----- Original Message -----
From: <jpehrson@rcn.com>

> Why, if these people aren't interested, do they still SUBSCRIBE??

They probably just let the email pile up on their hard drive.
They're interested, just not very serious.

David Beardsley
http://mp3.com/davidbeardsley

Joe,

--- In tuning@y..., jpehrson@r... wrote:
> So, if all these people are getting Tuning List e-mail in their in-
> boxes, they *must* be at least moderately interested... or they
> would UNSUBSCRIBE... rather than fill their in-boxes with
> more "spam..." wouldn't they??
>
> Am I missing something??

One thing you are missing, at least in your description, is that with
Yahoo Groups one option is to be a member of the list but receive no
email. I have taken to doing this on almost all of the splinter
groups, as by being a member I can post, download files, etc., but I
can just browse the msgs. I don't really have enough interest to
reply, but can scan topic headers (more reason to have them
pertinent) to see if there is anything of interest.

Another thing: many people who receive individual emails have filters
setup in their email programs to automatically place those in the
trash they so designate. Filters can be setup on who the email is
from, so particular 'correspondents' get dumped before even being
read. I know, because people have told me this about the list.

The more they have to filter, the less inclined they are to be
involved. And, yes, many just stay subbed and let the stuff pile up.

Cheers,
Jon

Well, I'm one of the mostly silent members of this list. I've got a MS in
math with a minor in Computer Science and have worked as a programmer for
over 25 years. I got interested in computer music in high school and actually
produced one piece in college. After leaving college music became my hobby,
singing in good church choirs and International medalist barbershop choruses.
I got back into computer music a few years back when I downloaded a copy of
Csound and started experimenting with it. I'm a digest subscriber and I do
read through them when they arrive. I usually post only when someone messes
up on his math and the error hasn't been caught by someone else in the same
digest. I consider myself an amateur, and am usually content to listen to
the "pros" and getting some ideas from their conversations.

Since I'm already posting, anyone have comments on a 5 4 4 5 4 5 4 scale in
31-tet. Neutral thirds interest me and this scale looked like a way to fit
them into a natural system.

David Bowen

In-Reply-To: <200107171346.IAA65028@spartan.americas.sgi.com>
David Bowen wrote:

> Since I'm already posting, anyone have comments on a 5 4 4 5 4 5 4
> scale in 31-tet. Neutral thirds interest me and this scale looked like
> a way to fit
> them into a natural system.

Yes! See <http://x31eq.com/7plus3.htm>!

Also, the scale mentioned here:

</crazy_music/topicId_474.html#474>

Looks like the same kind of thing, examples at
<http://tunesmithy.netfirms.com/tunes/tunes.htm>.

Graham

I found it in the mode list here:
http://www.xs4all.nl/~huygensf/doc/modename.html
as Neutral Lydian, note that this is in the Greek
ordering, where Dorian has two identical tetrachords
between C and F and between G and c.
For reading about tetrachords I recommend the book
John Chalmers: _Divisions of the Tetrachord_.

Manuel

To add to the theoretical stuff, I've now got round to recording my
neutral-third tuned mouth organ.

The raw sound of a mouth organ isn't so pleasant. But, because it has
lots of high partials, it works well with a resonant filter. For special
effects, I decided to link this filter to a foot pedal.

This piece for foot and mouth organ should have been uploaded to
<http://x31eq.com/fmorgan.mp3>. It almost works, a moderately
good evening's work.

Graham

--- In tuning@y..., graham@m... wrote:
> To add to the theoretical stuff, I've now got round to recording my
> neutral-third tuned mouth organ.
...
> This piece for foot and mouth organ should have been uploaded to
> <http://x31eq.com/fmorgan.mp3>.

This is fascinating. Please describe the tuning, including how it maps
to the mouth organ.

-- Dave Keenan

In-Reply-To: <9j2i2h+ls98@eGroups.com>
Dave Keenan wrote:

> > To add to the theoretical stuff, I've now got round to recording my
> > neutral-third tuned mouth organ.
> ...
> > This piece for foot and mouth organ should have been uploaded to
> > <http://x31eq.com/fmorgan.mp3>.
>
> This is fascinating. Please describe the tuning, including how it maps
> to the mouth organ.

It started out as a cheap diatonic mouth organ (blues harp) in C major.
(I think, if it was another key adjust the following accordingly.) The
way the tuning works, you can play C, G and Dm chords. So I retuned it so
that the thirds of those chords became neutral. That gives you a neutral
third MOS like the one that started this thread, although in 24-equal
rather than 31-equal.

I find it works very well, because beats between reeds are an important
feature of the sound of a mouth organ. I also have a double-reed model
that I retuned to 5-limit JI. It has a distinctive sound, may be useful
in some context, but thin on its own and not very mouth organ-ish.

Despite my efforts to hide it with a filter, you can hear in the example
where I played some "wrong notes" that don't form a neutral-third triad.
For some reason, neutral-third triads do sound "right" with very little
acculturation. This is the secret to neutral third scales functioning as
diatonics. Robert Walker's recent files actually demonstrate this quite
well, although he's using a 13-limit rationalisation I haven't considered.

The updated URL for retuning mouth organs is
<http://www.patmissin.com/tunings.html>. I think the instructions are all
in that zip file. I feel compelled to point out that I did this work a
couple of years ago, and am now completely out of practice, hence the
virtuosity in the example isn't what it should be.

Graham

Graham Breed wrote:
>
>The updated URL for retuning mouth organs is
><http://www.patmissin.com/tunings.html>. I think the instructions are all
>in that zip file. I feel compelled to point out that I did this work a
>couple of years ago, and am now completely out of practice, hence the
>virtuosity in the example isn't what it should be.

I was tempted to post to the "silent majority" thread to say that I have only posted a few times in the 5+ years that I have been subbed to this list not because I am not interested, but simply because I generally don't have much to contribute to the discussions that take place here, although I do learn a lot from them.

However, being the Pat Missin of the above url, if anyone has any queries regarding the retuning of free reed instruments, the harmonica in particular, as someone who actually earns his living doing this I feel quite qualified to field questions on this topic.

-- Pat.

I've recorded an example of my favourite neutral-third pentatonic. See
<http://x31eq.com/midi/pelog.htm>.

Graham

--- In tuning@y..., graham@m... wrote:
> To add to the theoretical stuff, I've now got round to recording my
> neutral-third tuned mouth organ.
>
> The raw sound of a mouth organ isn't so pleasant. But, because it
has
> lots of high partials, it works well with a resonant filter. For
special
> effects, I decided to link this filter to a foot pedal.
>
> This piece for foot and mouth organ

Entitled _Foot and Mouth Disease_?

--- In tuning@y..., Pat Missin <pat@p...> wrote:

/tuning/topicId_26242.html#26316

Hi Pat!

> I was tempted to post to the "silent majority" thread to say that I
have only posted a few times in the 5+ years that I have been subbed
to this list not because I am not interested, but simply because I
generally don't have much to contribute to the discussions that take
place here, although I do learn a lot from them.
>

See... so there doubting "Thomi..." (At least 1 is out there..)

________ ______ _____ ____
Joseph Pehrson

--- In tuning@y..., graham@m... wrote:
> I've recorded an example of my favourite neutral-third pentatonic.
See
> <http://x31eq.com/midi/pelog.htm>.

I found <http://x31eq.com/midi/pelog.mid> but not .htm.

So is the scale a single chain of 686c (7-EDO fifths)?

B---F$--C$
\ / \ where / and \ are neutral thirds?
A---E---B

-- Dave Keenan

In-Reply-To: <9j8o6s+lbep@eGroups.com>
Dave Keenan wrote:

> > I've recorded an example of my favourite neutral-third pentatonic.
> See
> > <http://x31eq.com/midi/pelog.htm>.
>
> I found <http://x31eq.com/midi/pelog.mid> but not .htm.

Oops!

> So is the scale a single chain of 686c (7-EDO fifths)?
>
> B---F$--C$
> \ / \ where / and \ are neutral thirds?
> A---E---B

And I forgot to upload the new copy of 7plus3.htm as well. No, it's not
7-equal and not a single chain of fifths. But it is an approximation to
that scale. It's actually this one:

A B D$ E G$ A
T t+T t T+t t

A----E-G$-B-D$

or

G$--D$
/ \ /
A---E---B

Graham