Microtonal != Atonal

Especially the bit about reaffirming the bit about tonality.

I do like a good bit of Schoenberg, and some Webern, but one always feels
that there is something very 'tonal' about their serial writing. I cannot
help but feel that the only reason for 'adding pitches' is to explore more
distant harmonic relationships. Inharmonic ones too; but what guides us is
the need for a measure of harmonic relatedness amongst the various tones,
and a sense of 'repose' and a sense of 'movement'. How we define these
terms is dependent upon many factors, and certainly more than just the
abstract 'pitch' of a note.

I can't hold with the

microtonal == atonal

argument. For me, microtonality is tonality with wider pallette of tones.

M

> Yes, I know that not everything is going to appeal to everyone and
> that, when it comes to taste, "mass" often correlates with "crass."
> But in order for art to be successful, it must communicate, and in
> order to communicate it must have an audience outside one's own
> circle of artists or composers. Is this more likely to happen by
> pursuing an atonal or pantonal approach or by establishing an
> expanded harmonic vocabulary through the employment of intervals
> representing or approximating those found above the sixth harmonic
> (while reaffirming the traditional concept of tonality, including the
> principle of consonance and dissonance)?
>
> Such is the rationale for advocating the approach to microtonality
> that I have taken.

--- In tuning@y..., "Mark Gould" <mark.gould@a...> wrote:

/tuning/topicId_38257.html#38257

> Especially the bit about reaffirming the bit about tonality.
>
> I do like a good bit of Schoenberg, and some Webern, but one always
feels that there is something very 'tonal' about their serial
writing.

***Hello Mark!

I think the *repeated notes* even in Schoenberg's *most* serialized
work set up a sense of rootedness or "tonality..." Where's Monzo??

Same for Milton Babbitt. Actually, the way Babbitt *repeats* pitches
is one of the most interesting features of his work...

J. Pehrson