Does anyone here use the Ztar?

Greetings, all,

My name is Andrew Heathwaite. I am a music student who has recently
discovered microtonality/xenharmony and pursued it vehemently through the
internet. I joined this email list a little while ago to help me continue
to learn. I've been deeply inspired by the potential I've discovered in
xenharmony, and I'm planning to get some equipment that will allow me to
improvise and compose in non-12 tunings. My first instruments of choice for
this endeaver shall be a midi keyboard controller, X. J. Scott's "Li'l Miss'
Scale Oven," and Cubase VST with some softsynths that I already have.

I don't have a midi keyboard yet, but I'm already beginning to understand
the frustration that will go with trying to force any number of pitches per
octave other than twelve onto its keys. In my opinion, the traditional
piano keyboard is shamefully less than ideal for 12-notes scales, let alone
any other number.

I have read about the Wilson Microzone (UATH) models of keyboard from Starr
Labs (http://www.starrlabs.com), and although the design seems spectacular,
both models are excruciatingly out of my price range.

The other thing on that site that intrigued me was the Ztar, a guitar-like
midi controller with separate keys for each crossing of a "string" and a
"fret". Although nothing about microtonality is mentioned on the site, I
imagine that the Ztar could be retuned via software and become a fantastic
microtonal instrument.

I understand that a great number of experienced microtonalists are on this
list, so I thought I'd take a shot in the dark that maybe someone here has
used the Ztar for just this purpose. If so, I am curious to know how well
it works, what software the Ztarist(s) use, and what sort of scale
arrangements they have created for the fretboard.

Thanks in advance to anyone with something to say about this.

-Andrew Heathwaite

p.s. I have listened to music by many members of this list, and it has
expanded my ears and inspired me to think in new ways. I am grateful to
anyone who has made their microtonal/xenharmonic music available online,
because it has been a great tool for my growing ears. Thank you.

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hello Andrew, and welcome to the tuning list,

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Andrew Heathwaite <gtrpkt@y...> wrote:

> I have read about the Wilson Microzone (UATH) models
> of keyboard from Starr Labs (http://www.starrlabs.com),
> and although the design seems spectacular, both models
> are excruciatingly out of my price range.
>
> The other thing on that site that intrigued me was the Ztar,
> a guitar-like midi controller with separate keys for each
> crossing of a "string" and a "fret". Although nothing
> about microtonality is mentioned on the site, I imagine
> that the Ztar could be retuned via software and become
> a fantastic microtonal instrument.
>
> I understand that a great number of experienced microtonalists
> are on this list, so I thought I'd take a shot in the dark
> that maybe someone here has used the Ztar for just this purpose.
> If so, I am curious to know how well it works, what software
> the Ztarist(s) use, and what sort of scale arrangements
> they have created for the fretboard.

i actually worked for Harvey Starr briefly, on some of the
microzones. i've posted some things about the Ztar, and
still hope to get one myself.

list-member Graham Breed has one. Graham?

i have some examples of microtonal mappings to the Ztar here:

http://tonalsoft.com/enc/72edo.htm

-monz

-----Urspr�ngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Andrew Heathwaite [mailto:gtrpkt@yahoo.com]
Gesendet: Montag, 15. Dezember 2003 08:38
An: tuning@yahoogroups.com
Betreff: [tuning] Does anyone here use the Ztar?

Greetings, all,

My name is Andrew Heathwaite. I am a music student who has recently
discovered microtonality/xenharmony and pursued it vehemently through the
internet. I joined this email list a little while ago to help me continue
to learn. I've been deeply inspired by the potential I've discovered in
xenharmony, and I'm planning to get some equipment that will allow me to
improvise and compose in non-12 tunings. My first instruments of choice
for
this endeaver shall be a midi keyboard controller, X. J. Scott's "Li'l
Miss'
Scale Oven," and Cubase VST with some softsynths that I already have.

I don't have a midi keyboard yet, but I'm already beginning to understand
the frustration that will go with trying to force any number of pitches
per
octave other than twelve onto its keys. In my opinion, the traditional
piano keyboard is shamefully less than ideal for 12-notes scales, let
alone
any other number.

I have read about the Wilson Microzone (UATH) models of keyboard from
Starr
Labs (http://www.starrlabs.com), and although the design seems
spectacular,
both models are excruciatingly out of my price range.

The other thing on that site that intrigued me was the Ztar, a guitar-like
midi controller with separate keys for each crossing of a "string" and a
"fret". Although nothing about microtonality is mentioned on the site, I
imagine that the Ztar could be retuned via software and become a fantastic
microtonal instrument.

I understand that a great number of experienced microtonalists are on this
list, so I thought I'd take a shot in the dark that maybe someone here has
used the Ztar for just this purpose. If so, I am curious to know how well
it works, what software the Ztarist(s) use, and what sort of scale
arrangements they have created for the fretboard.

Thanks in advance to anyone with something to say about this.

-Andrew Heathwaite

p.s. I have listened to music by many members of this list, and it has
expanded my ears and inspired me to think in new ways. I am grateful to
anyone who has made their microtonal/xenharmonic music available online,
because it has been a great tool for my growing ears. Thank you.

Hi Andrew,

I don' know the Ztar but I know that the "FM7" of Native Instruments
supports the MIDI data format "Scale Octave Tuning Real Time". With this
data format it is possible to control every MIDI Note to "every frequency"
by a fineness of about 1/164 Cents "in abstract". There exists also a second
instrument at Native Instruments which supports this data format, but I
forgot the name. You can ask Michael Kurz at Native Instruments:
michael@native-instruments.de

"In abstract" means: I don't know whether the internal system of this
instrument supports such a high fineness. Ask Michael Kurz.
"Every frequency" means every frequency between the deepest and the
highest tone of the referred instrument

There exist, too, physical electronic instruments which support this data
format: All actual VIRUS syntesizers of ACCESS:
www.kemper-digital.com
These instruments support this tuning fineness not only "in abstract" but,
too, in reality.

Informations in the MIDI data format "Scale Octave Tuning Real Time" you
will find at
www.midi.org

If you will not find them I can send you these informations directly. In
this case please write me by
wmohrlok@hermode.com

Werner Mohrlok

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Andrew Heathwaite wrote:

I understand that a great number of experienced microtonalists are on this
list, so I thought I'd take a shot in the dark that maybe someone here has
used the Ztar for just this purpose. If so, I am curious to know how well
it works, what software the Ztarist(s) use, and what sort of scale
arrangements they have created for the fretboard.

Andrew, I have a Ztar and have been using it for a number of
years. It's a fine instrument, it plays well, and is nice for
microtonal work because its not a one dimensional array.
Of course, it still isnt perfect...

I use a lot of different software - Max is great for customizing
the interface and for doing the kinds of adaptive tuning things.
I also use Bitheadz Unity as a software sampler
(reasonable tuning table support). I also use a (hardware)
sampler, an ASR-10.

In case you haven't heard it, most of the music on my
website was played with the Ztar
and then multitracked... all of it is in non-12 tunings:

http://eceserv0.ece.wisc.edu/~sethares/otherperson/all_mp3s.html

As for what scales to use for the fretboard - this is a vast
terrain. I find that with each new tuning or temperament I try a
bunch of things and then settle on one that seems to work.
I have yet to find any universal principles though I toss
out a few ideas at:

http://eceserv0.ece.wisc.edu/~sethares/alternatetunings/alternatetunings.html

--Bill Sethares