Ibn Sina’s mujannab

On the Oud, the mujannab is the first semitone fret
above the open string. Henry George Farmer in �The
Music of Islam� states that Ibn Sina does not �admit
the �anterior� fret at 90 cents, but furnishes the
just semitone of 112 cents in its place�.
Unfortunately, throughout this article, Farmer does
not state ratios, but cents only. 112 cents would
imply a ratio of 16/15, but I do not understand the
rationale behind this ratio.
This mujannab second is important, because several
makams require it, and good Ney players will treat it
ever so differently. Theoretically, both the Kurdi and
Segah makam start with the same interval, but the good
players will widen the Segah minor second a little bit
more than the Kurdi second. If my ears are worth
anything than we are talking differences of less than
a comma, but they are audible, and emotionally very
effective.
I checked Cris Forster�s website and Dave Benson�s
paper, but they talk about fourths, fifths, major and
minor thirds, but not about minor seconds. As I am
only beginning to work myself into intonation
questions, I don�t understand why Farmer uses the term
�just intonation� for those 112 cents. Can anybody
explain it to me?
Thank you,
Michael

___________________________________________________________
Yahoo! Messenger - NEW crystal clear PC to PC calling worldwide with voicemail http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com

Hi Michael,

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Michael Zapf <zapfzapfzapf@y...> wrote:

> On the Oud, the mujannab is the first semitone fret
> above the open string. Henry George Farmer in "The
> Music of Islam" states that Ibn Sina does not "admit
> the `anterior' fret at 90 cents, but furnishes the
> just semitone of 112 cents in its place".
> Unfortunately, throughout this article, Farmer does
> not state ratios, but cents only. 112 cents would
> imply a ratio of 16/15, but I do not understand the
> rationale behind this ratio.
> This mujannab second is important, because several
> makams require it, and good Ney players will treat it
> ever so differently. Theoretically, both the Kurdi and
> Segah makam start with the same interval, but the good
> players will widen the Segah minor second a little bit
> more than the Kurdi second. If my ears are worth
> anything than we are talking differences of less than
> a comma, but they are audible, and emotionally very
> effective.
> I checked Cris Forster's website and Dave Benson's
> paper, but they talk about fourths, fifths, major and
> minor thirds, but not about minor seconds. As I am
> only beginning to work myself into intonation
> questions, I don't understand why Farmer uses the term
> "just intonation" for those 112 cents. Can anybody
> explain it to me?
> Thank you,
> Michael

Aside from my single webpage on "Arab Lute Fretting"

http://tonalsoft.com/monzo/arablute/arablute.htm

i'm out of my league discussing these tunings. But
what i can say is that, from your description here,
it appears that Farmer simply retuned the
diatonic-semitone from the pythagorean 256:243 ratio
= 2,3-monzo [8 -5> = ~90.22499567 cents, to the 5-limit
JI version of 16:15 ratio = 2,3,5-monzo [4 -1, -1> =
~111.7312853 cents.

See:
http://tonalsoft.com/enc/d/diatonic-semitone.aspx

Hope that helps.

-monz
http://tonalsoft.com
Tonescape microtonal music software

Dear Michael,

Your confusion about the mujannab fret is completely justified.
Happily, there is an easy explanation.

In: _Studies in Oriental Musical Instruments, Second Series_, pp. 51-
53, Farmer gives Ibn Sina's original `ud tuning as described in the
Kitab al-shifa, and on pp. 54-55, he gives an accurate English
translation. On p. 55, he accurately gives ratio 273/256, [111.3
cents], for the mujannab fret, and inaccurately gives the value 112
cents. The latter inaccurate cent value also appears in: _The Music
of Islam_, p. 461.

From my: _Musical Mathematics: A Practice in the Mathematics of
Tuning Instruments and Analyzing Scales_:

******************************

"The illustrious successor to Al-Farabi was Ibn Sina (980–1037).
The next discussion will focus on Ibn Sina's musical treatises in
the Kitab al-shifa (Book of the cure) and in the Kitab al-najat
(Book of the delivery). A French translation of the former exists
in D'Erlanger's _La Musique Arabe_, Volume 2, and a German
translation of the latter is contained in Mahmoud el-Hefny's
dissertation _Ibn Sina's Musiklehre_ (Ibn Sina's teaching on
music). Although these two texts give slightly different procedures
for the division of lute strings, in the final analysis both tunings
are identical."

******************************

Hefny also accurately gives ratio 273/256 on p. 49.

Sincerely,

Cris Forster, Music Director
http://www.Chrysalis-Foundation.org

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Michael Zapf <zapfzapfzapf@y...>
wrote:
> On the Oud, the mujannab is the first semitone fret
> above the open string. Henry George Farmer in "The
> Music of Islam" states that Ibn Sina does not "admit
> the `anterior' fret at 90 cents, but furnishes the
> just semitone of 112 cents in its place".
> Unfortunately, throughout this article, Farmer does
> not state ratios, but cents only. 112 cents would
> imply a ratio of 16/15, but I do not understand the
> rationale behind this ratio.
> This mujannab second is important, because several
> makams require it, and good Ney players will treat it
> ever so differently. Theoretically, both the Kurdi and
> Segah makam start with the same interval, but the good
> players will widen the Segah minor second a little bit
> more than the Kurdi second. If my ears are worth
> anything than we are talking differences of less than
> a comma, but they are audible, and emotionally very
> effective.
> I checked Cris Forster's website and Dave Benson's
> paper, but they talk about fourths, fifths, major and
> minor thirds, but not about minor seconds. As I am
> only beginning to work myself into intonation
> questions, I don't understand why Farmer uses the term
> "just intonation" for those 112 cents. Can anybody
> explain it to me?
> Thank you,
> Michael
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ___________________________________________________________
> Yahoo! Messenger - NEW crystal clear PC to PC calling worldwide
with voicemail http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com

Cris Forster wrote:
<In: _Studies in Oriental Musical Instruments, Second
Series_, pp. 51-53, Farmer gives Ibn Sina's original
`ud tuning as described in the Kitab al-shifa>

Got it! In case the 1978 edition is out of print, and
in case anybody else is interested, the Frankfurt
'Institut f�r Geschichte der Arabisch-Islamischen
Wissenschaften' has republished the entire Farmer in
two volumes, unfortunately with new page numbers, but
the edition is a facsimile so the text is reliable.
The Ibn Sina is in Volume Two, pp. 173-188, "The Lute
Scale of Avicenna".
http://web.uni-frankfurt.de/fb13/igaiw/publication/music.html
Michael

___________________________________________________________
To help you stay safe and secure online, we've developed the all new Yahoo! Security Centre. http://uk.security.yahoo.com

I wrote:
<The Ibn Sina is in Volume Two, pp. 173-188, "The Lute
Scale of Avicenna".>

Actually, the current publications list of the
Frankfurt
Institute only shows Volume One, which is a 1997 2nd
edition of their 1986 Volume One. Their Volume Two 2nd
edition is out of print. What they do not show on
their webpage is that they still have both 1st
editions available for sale, but only in tandem. I
know it because this is how I got both these volumes
only a few weeks ago.
Michael

___________________________________________________________
How much free photo storage do you get? Store your holiday
snaps for FREE with Yahoo! Photos http://uk.photos.yahoo.com

Michael,

I completely agree with you and this is part of a long-
running "debate" on the meaning of JI intervals. It seems you may
agree with Dave Keenan's definition of the term JI, which I invite
him to elaborate on in this context. I believe that these differences
in intontation of less than a comma are indeed powerful and
expressive as you say, and that they have absolutely nothing to do
with JI or particular exact whole-number ratios. But this is a very
unpopular view on this list, where a deep preoccupation with and
belief in exact ratios predominates.

On the other hand, 16/15 meaningfully occurs in a JI tuning system as
a result of (at least) three notes tuned in sequential JI; for
example, a 4:3 followed by a 4:5 (since 1/1 * 4:3 * 4:5 = 16/15).

Take care,
Paul

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Michael Zapf <zapfzapfzapf@y...> wrote:
> On the Oud, the mujannab is the first semitone fret
> above the open string. Henry George Farmer in "The
> Music of Islam" states that Ibn Sina does not "admit
> the `anterior' fret at 90 cents, but furnishes the
> just semitone of 112 cents in its place".
> Unfortunately, throughout this article, Farmer does
> not state ratios, but cents only. 112 cents would
> imply a ratio of 16/15, but I do not understand the
> rationale behind this ratio.
> This mujannab second is important, because several
> makams require it, and good Ney players will treat it
> ever so differently. Theoretically, both the Kurdi and
> Segah makam start with the same interval, but the good
> players will widen the Segah minor second a little bit
> more than the Kurdi second. If my ears are worth
> anything than we are talking differences of less than
> a comma, but they are audible, and emotionally very
> effective.
> I checked Cris Forster's website and Dave Benson's
> paper, but they talk about fourths, fifths, major and
> minor thirds, but not about minor seconds. As I am
> only beginning to work myself into intonation
> questions, I don't understand why Farmer uses the term
> "just intonation" for those 112 cents. Can anybody
> explain it to me?
> Thank you,
> Michael
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ___________________________________________________________
> Yahoo! Messenger - NEW crystal clear PC to PC calling worldwide
with voicemail http://uk.messenger.yahoo.com