everybody loves microtones.......................

ha!

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.music.makers.guitar.jazz/browse_thread/thread/d88891cb84b183ed/33495c148d72626b#33495c148d72626b

I am only saddened to see that they think we Easterners practice on a basis
of 12 equal tones!

--------------------------

danstearns wrote:
> hmmm......and i thought it was one of my more "normalish" pieces!

Dan, I read the description of how the pianos were tuned and was
intrigued. So I listened to it thinking "Oh man, this is gonna hurt but
I can always turn it off". I was amazed at how painless it was. Yes,
that sounds like damning with faint praise but I was expecting it to be
completely unlistenable discordant cacophony. But my mind/ears adapted
very quickly and it was really just music after a while. I listened to
the entire concert.

Does the 17-tone scale "line up" particularly well with 12-tone? I can
understand why 24-tone Eastern music doesn't sound completely alien
because all the Western intervals are still there. Is that the case
with 17-tone as well? Is there some tuning that would be guaranteed to
sound "all wrong"? Like, I'm guessing, 11- or 13- tone?

SNIP

> Does the 17-tone scale "line up" particularly well with 12-tone? I
can
> understand why 24-tone Eastern music doesn't sound completely alien
> because all the Western intervals are still there. Is that the case
> with 17-tone as well?

17-tone, whether it is equal, or with basically "equal" regions
(like a well-temperament), or all the way out to more or less straight
Pythagorean, is one of the most "accessible" of the "microtonal"
tunings, in my opinion.

I realized today as I was whistling the opening figure of a
scratchy old album I listened to day in day out as a child, of
Hungarian gypsies playing homemade instruments, how many sounds in 17,
especially the seconds, are suspiciously similar, so my love of 17 may
come from a bias of almost 40 years. :-)

The closest uses to Western music would be, for example, a major scale:
(0 is the tonic, 0° the octave, the numbers are steps)

0,3,3,1,3,3,3,1,0°

In 12-tone the large steps are 2 and the small steps 1. So right away
you know 17 tends to be more "romantic", in other words, reminiscent
of what's called expressive intonation in Western music.

In this scale from 17 tones, the M2 is right there where the second is
in many, many, tunings including the M2 of contemporary Western music,
just somewhat broad. It's wide of 12-tone equal temperament, 11
cents higher, but there's a lot less 12-tET than there appears to be:
the most straightforward M2, 9/8, which happens all the time in
real-life performances of music that's 12-tET on paper, is also wide
of 12-tET's 200 cents, by about 4 cents.

The M3 is quite high, but nothing you haven't heard in music from
around the world, and in Western orchestral or choral music in
different contexts (if the violin melody is stepping up to the fourth,
or it's a very cheerful song, the third might be performed "wide", for
example).

Depending on what kind of 17-tone tuning, the P4 might be just that,
a 4/3, or it might be a little low/dark. But still obviously a
fourth, just a little dramatic.

The fifth is usually great- it's usually a tiny bit wide and
"brassy", which is how I like it, and I suspect that it is actually,
literally, brassy- ie, similiar to the stretched-harmonics fifths
of a brass intrument. Completely in keeping with traditional
emotional "fifths" associations of simultaneous consonance, boldness
and brightness.

The M6 is just that, brighter than 12-tET's, with one curious
characteristic. Because the M3 is so high and active-sounding, the
relatively straight-sounding M6 gives the "major scale" in 17 a touch
of modal or ancient sound, to my ears. It's also very faintly flavored
like the "harmonic major" of Slavic music, where you have a minor
sixth used in a major scale. Another source of my bias toward 17,
probably.

The M7 in a 17-tone "major scale" is high, very leading-tone
sounding.

That's just one possibility with 17 tones. From there you have
corollaries to all the "church modes", then a huge number of
so-called "altered" scales.

And of course, the wonderful "median" intervals, because with 17 tones
you can have a dark version of each interval, a bright version, and a
median version which is somewhat dark, or bright, or something else
altogether, depending on context. These are great intervals and
harmonies, perhaps more difficult to use than major or minor, but
emotionally... I just don't have the words.

In spite of the technical name "median" or "neutral" for many of the
intervals you can get in 17, the tuning doesn't do "medium" sounding
things well. It doesn't have the calmness of a tuning that gives
you a "high" ie. most pure minor third and a "low" pure major third.
(6/5 and 5/4). The mellowness of the "median" intervals in 17 is
completely different.

As far as modulation, you can go from oily smoothness, just as you can
in any tuning with many small intervals, to violent leaps.

It so happens that my take on the "accessibility" of 17-tone
tunings isn't theoretical, but is coming from the trenches. Friday
I had an outdoor concert, following two hours of "put your hands in
the air" DJing no less, with a third of the music in 17 (the rest
in a well-temperament 12, with some outre tuning flourishes). I
believe that only the synth player from another band even noticed
that there was "alternative" tuning going on, and he was thrilled.

Very positive audience response. A couple of qualifiers: Slovenia,
where I live, is the borderland of Europe and the Balkans, even the
most mainstream audience has heard all kinds of tunings and rhythms in
their life.

Also, as Frank Zappa remarked, Schoenberg would be
popular if he had the Earth, Wind and Fire rhythm section: even if
they're odd rhythms, I've got percussion thumping along quite a bit.

And another qualifier- for concerts I do longer and more repetitive
versions of tunes with a "ritornello", so I saw a couple of
people singing along at the end of the tunes. Also, preceding
the ritornello, a freak-out or unabashedly "out" bit, so the main
theme has even more clarity and simplicity in contrast.
That's just familiarity, plain and simple, and increasing the feeling
of consonance by using dissonance.

Like it or not, "microtonalists" in our time do have something of a
pedegogical responsibility to their audience.

Sorry to ramble on, just a big fan of seventeen and very happy with
it. Slices, dices, and that's not all!

If you go here:

http://www.medieval.org/emfaq/harmony/pyth.html

and read what Margo Schulter has written on Gothic polyphony, you'll
find a great introduction to one beautiful way of using 17-tone
tunings. I'm studying this also, in order to enrich my fundamentally
tetrachordal approach, which I derived from a Bulgarian textbook
years ago.

Take care,

-Cameron Bobro

misterbobro wrote:

> > Does the 17-tone scale "line up" particularly well with 12-tone? I
> can
> > understand why 24-tone Eastern music doesn't sound completely alien
> > because all the Western intervals are still there. Is that the case
> > with 17-tone as well?
>
> 17-tone, whether it is equal, or with basically "equal" regions
> (like a well-temperament), or all the way out to more or less straight
> Pythagorean, is one of the most "accessible" of the "microtonal"
> tunings, in my opinion.

You got a good advertisement for 17-tone. That, along with 19- and 24-tone, are probably the best tunings for beginners. I just started writing music for 17-tone piano (actually synth; I don't own a 17-tone piano), using a well-temperament for myself.

> The M3 is quite high, but nothing you haven't heard in music from
> around the world, and in Western orchestral or choral music in
> different contexts (if the violin melody is stepping up to the fourth,
> or it's a very cheerful song, the third might be performed "wide", for
> example).

The major third is close to 14/11 (417.51 cents), which Partch had in his 43-tone JI set. I call it a "tense major third", and 5/4 a "lax major third".

> In spite of the technical name "median" or "neutral" for many of the
> intervals you can get in 17, the tuning doesn't do "medium" sounding
> things well. It doesn't have the calmness of a tuning that gives
> you a "high" ie. most pure minor third and a "low" pure major third.
> (6/5 and 5/4). The mellowness of the "median" intervals in 17 is
> completely different.

It's still a good introduction to neutral intervals. The E half-flat is 352.94 cents, which lies between 11/9 (347.41) and 16/13 (359.47) and is acceptably close to both. It's even closer to 27/22 (354.55), a traditional ratio in Middle Eastern music.

~D.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:
>
> misterbobro wrote:

> You got a good advertisement for 17-tone. That, along with 19- and
24-tone,
> are probably the best tunings for beginners. I just started writing
music
> for 17-tone piano (actually synth; I don't own a 17-tone piano),
using a
> well-temperament for myself.

Its lack of decent major or minor triads I think means it isn't very
good for beginners in the Western tradition, unless they want to
escape that tradition.

> The major third is close to 14/11 (417.51 cents), which Partch had
in his
> 43-tone JI set. I call it a "tense major third", and 5/4 a "lax major
> third".

It's sharper than a 14/11 major third, more a 23/18. Such thirds lack
the sweet, restful quality of a true minor third, or even the mildly
agitated quality of a 400 cent minor third, and have quite a different
sound. The 4 out of 17 subminor third I think works better. In fact,
it is a good 20/17 minor third.

> > In spite of the technical name "median" or "neutral" for many of the
> > intervals you can get in 17, the tuning doesn't do "medium" sounding
> > things well. It doesn't have the calmness of a tuning that gives
> > you a "high" ie. most pure minor third and a "low" pure major third.
> > (6/5 and 5/4). The mellowness of the "median" intervals in 17 is
> > completely different.
>
> It's still a good introduction to neutral intervals.

A good start; if it had a decent 7/5-10/7 to go with it it would be
excellent. Unfortunately, you really need to divide 17 into quarters
and go to 68 to make that work. I think 31 makes for a much better
introduction to neutral thirds than does 17.

> The E half-flat is
> 352.94 cents, which lies between 11/9 (347.41) and 16/13 (359.47)
and is
> acceptably close to both. It's even closer to 27/22 (354.55), a
traditional
> ratio in Middle Eastern music.

Closer yet to the larger septimal neutral third, 49/40, but that fact
doesn't do us any good unless we go 68.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:
> You got a good advertisement for 17-tone. That, along with 19- and
24-tone,
> are probably the best tunings for beginners. I just started
writing music
> for 17-tone piano (actually synth; I don't own a 17-tone piano),
using a
> well-temperament for myself.

Are you using a softsynth that takes Scala files? To my ears tunings
that are "justified" by higher primes reveal themselves with very
precise tuning of the synth.

I'm going through the backbreaking (okay, back-aching, I hate
sitting down) process of creating and precisely tuning individual
samples in Csound, then loading them into my Ensoniq EPS one key at
a time. This way I avoid the 1.56 cent tuning slop of the EPS (which
still whips most other hardware synths). Less important and chorused
type sounds I do with fewer samples, programming the EPS tuning
tables- if the sound is swimming in pitch a couple of cents anyway,
it fuzzes over the little errors.

For things like Pi-based non-octave tunings and linking harmonics to
tunings it's just Csound straight no chaser. 17 I can jam on and
play in concert, it's very practical (and my Theremin player has a
hard enough life anyway).

A great "3:1" fifth for 17, IMO, and a beautiful sounding fifth, is
found at Pi*22/23, about 704.8 cents, but I haven't had the time to
work out a tuning using it.

How do you have your keys mapped? I tune from G# 416Hz, so it's
logical to have the G#/Ab key as a central point, and the octaves of
the central Do land very conveniently on black keys, easy to get
used to.

> The major third is close to 14/11 (417.51 cents), which Partch had
>in his 43-tone JI set. I call it a "tense major third", and 5/4
> a "lax major third".

To my ears, 17 equal or equal-regions in its nude and primal state
does have the 14/11 third, and that's exactly what I (try to) play
on the fretless guitar, and sing. In my 17 rational tuning, the
highest third is 23/18, with rational variations in different keys
down to 1 cent below 14/11. The overall feeling is 14/11 in some
keys, and 23/18 in others.

> It's still a good introduction to neutral intervals. The E half-
flat is
> 352.94 cents, which lies between 11/9 (347.41) and 16/13 (359.47)
and is
> acceptably close to both. It's even closer to 27/22 (354.55), a
traditional
> ratio in Middle Eastern music.

The median thirds I use range from 27/22 down to 11/9, and the
different keys vary between those two feelings. :-) I tried working
with 13 as a prominent prime, but wound up very much 11's and 23's,
skipping 17 and 19 altogether (they don't show up in the tuning at
all). Of course I have cornball theories as to why this happened,
haha.

Well, have to sleep sometime, so good night and see you later,

-Cameron Bobro

i think that 31 is is an excellent first tuning in that many of the things a person is used to are there , also the notation is quite easy to understand.
from there it is quite easy to expand into exploring the harmonics up to 11.
neither 17 or 24 really offer new consonances to explore
--
Kraig Grady
North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island <http://anaphoria.com/>
The Wandering Medicine Show
KXLU <http://www.kxlu.com/main.html> 88.9 FM Wed 8-9 pm Los Angeles

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Gene Ward Smith" <genewardsmith@...>
wrote:

> Its lack of decent major or minor triads I think means it isn't
very
> good for beginners in the Western tradition, unless they want to
> escape that tradition.

The Western tradition has been running on several tracks for a long
time now, as far as tuning. Orchestras and choirs are can work with
5 and 7 limit harmonies, but ET keyboards and guitars are
Pythagorean in nature. Music based on the the idea that the thirds
are of the 6/5 and 5/4 character families is audibly dishonest and
kitsch in the patently Pythagorean world of (fixed) 12-tET. Bold,
military, cheerful, aggressive M3s; sad, aching, bittersweet m3s:
all that flies. Stately, serene, calm, or honeyed thirds- they're
just not there.

High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a thousand
plus years, a part of the Western tradition.

You're right that the triads in 17 aren't decent- they're beautiful.

If you like big noses.

But of course if someone wants to travel further in the other
direction as far as the characters of thirds and triads, it is as
you say, and as I said in my earlier post- 17 doesn't do that well.

About the median thirds- in rational tunings of course, the median
thirds like 11/9 and 23/18 are more than just "represented", they're
right there, along with other rational median thirds.

7/4 is crap of course, as bad as the laughable idea of 12-tET
representing 7-limit. Instead of monkeying with it, I just left the
prime 7 out of my tuning altogether. :-) It seems that many are
seeking great action in the 7s, an admirable goal IMO. Recorded and
analized a contrabass- it had such a strong seventh partial that it
sang like an accompanying alto voice. Good sevens deserve their own
tunings, not approximations. 23 and 11 are the soulmates of 17, IMO.

take care,

-Cameron Bobro

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Kraig Grady <kraiggrady@...> wrote:
>
> i think that 31 is is an excellent first tuning in that many of the
> things a person is used to are there , also the notation is quite easy
> to understand.

Alternatively, if it is important to explore fifths in the vicinity of
705 cents, which seems to be part of the idea here as I understand it,
34 and 46 come to mind. How to get these to work in live performances
is another question.

misterbobro wrote (in response to me):

> Are you using a softsynth that takes Scala files? To my ears tunings
> that are "justified" by higher primes reveal themselves with very
> precise tuning of the synth.

Right now, all I have is a cheap Sound Blaster Live! which doesn't have microtuning, so I have to put pitch bends in sequenced files. I can't get Scala to run on this computer (it's worked before, even after Gtk+ had to be installed separately), so I don't have the retuning function right now.

I use Noteworthy Composer to make MIDI files and Audacity to convert to mp3 or wma. NWC is non-free, but not too expensive; Audacity is free.

> For things like Pi-based non-octave tunings and linking harmonics to
> tunings it's just Csound straight no chaser. 17 I can jam on and
> play in concert, it's very practical (and my Theremin player has a
> hard enough life anyway).

You know if you use a period of pi and a generator of e (~2.718) and make an 87-tone scale, what you get is virtually 53-tone equal temperament, right?

> How do you have your keys mapped? I tune from G# 416Hz, so it's
> logical to have the G#/Ab key as a central point, and the octaves of
> the central Do land very conveniently on black keys, easy to get
> used to.

I either have A4=440 or C4=261 and go from there. Going from C, the default tuning for the twelve keys in 17-tone is 0 1 3 4 6 7 8 10 11 13 14 16 17. Or in Pythagorean terms, C Db D Eb E F Gb G Ab A Bb B C.

In my own keyboard design, which adds a third row of "red keys", five per octave in front of the white keys and usually played with the thumb, the lower row plays the half-flats.

> To my ears, 17 equal or equal-regions in its nude and primal state
> does have the 14/11 third, and that's exactly what I (try to) play
> on the fretless guitar, and sing. In my 17 rational tuning, the
> highest third is 23/18, with rational variations in different keys
> down to 1 cent below 14/11. The overall feeling is 14/11 in some
> keys, and 23/18 in others.

I'm stopping at 13-limit right now. 17, 19 and 23 are possible in the future.

> The median thirds I use range from 27/22 down to 11/9, and the
> different keys vary between those two feelings. :-) I tried working
> with 13 as a prominent prime, but wound up very much 11's and 23's,
> skipping 17 and 19 altogether (they don't show up in the tuning at
> all). Of course I have cornball theories as to why this happened,
> haha.

Someone once noted that Partch's 11-limit scale is intuitively 41-tone equal temperament. My own 13-limit would fit into 53-tone.

I still say that 17, as well as 19 and the obvious 24, is something a novice should work with before going on to higher numbers.

~D.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:
> Right now, all I have is a cheap Sound Blaster Live! which doesn't
have
> microtuning, so I have to put pitch bends in sequenced files. I
can't get
> Scala to run on this computer (it's worked before, even after Gtk+
had to be
> installed separately), so I don't have the retuning function right
now.

If you hop on over to http://www.kvr-audio.com, there is a huge
resource of free and cheap software synths and samplers so you can
get different sounds. Actually if you use Soundfonts with your
SoundBlaster you can get decent sounds, it's mostly the
accuracy of the tuning I was wondering about. I agree wholeheartedly
with... can't remember which famous microtonalist... about higher
limits being really accurately tuned.

> You know if you use a period of pi and a generator of e (~2.718)
and make an
> 87-tone scale, what you get is virtually 53-tone equal
temperament, right?

Nope I didn't know! That's cool.

> In my own keyboard design, which adds a third row of "red keys",
five per
> octave in front of the white keys and usually played with the
thumb, the
> lower row plays the half-flats.

And that's cool too. Hmmm...

> I still say that 17, as well as 19 and the obvious 24, is
something a novice
> should work with before going on to higher numbers.

I think it should all be driven mostly by artistic needs- salted
with physical realities because the point after all is to actually
make music. :-)

-Cameron Bobro

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Gene Ward Smith" <genewardsmith@...>
wrote:
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, Kraig Grady <kraiggrady@> wrote:
> >
> > i think that 31 is is an excellent first tuning in that many of
the
> > things a person is used to are there , also the notation is quite
easy
> > to understand.
>
> Alternatively, if it is important to explore fifths in the vicinity
of
> 705 cents, which seems to be part of the idea here as I understand
it,
> 34 and 46 come to mind. How to get these to work in live performances
> is another question.
>

Made a 34, it dovetails into the 17 (49/48 inside of 25/24, those
being the original building blocks). But... it also has big holes
harmonically so I'd rather intertwine a completely different tuning-
sleek modulation between very different tunings being the long-term
goal.

As far as live performance, at some point it would have to come
down to setting the frets for a specific number of modes, so to
speak. So the big tunings would be supersets live.

-Cameron Bobro

-Cameron Bobro

misterbobro wrote:

> If you hop on over to http://www.kvr-audio.com, there is a huge
> resource of free and cheap software synths and samplers so you can
> get different sounds. Actually if you use Soundfonts with your
> SoundBlaster you can get decent sounds, it's mostly the
> accuracy of the tuning I was wondering about. I agree wholeheartedly
> with... can't remember which famous microtonalist... about higher
> limits being really accurately tuned.

I will check that out very soon, thanks.

> > In my own keyboard design, which adds a third row of "red keys",
> five per
>> octave in front of the white keys and usually played with the
> thumb, the
>> lower row plays the half-flats.
>
> And that's cool too. Hmmm...

If only I had one built; I don't have the money, materials or ability. But I think it's been done before; it's an obvious extension of the ol' Halberstadt layout. I've also seen/heard of black keys split in half, and a design by an Egyptian a century-ish ago with a third row using shorter and higher black keys. (I have the name and a Xerox of the photo somewhere.)

I'm just now familiarizing myself with the Seventeen-Tone Piano Project, and it looks like the instruments use two rows with wider octaves and groups of five black keys.

~D.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@...> wrote:

> The Western tradition has been running on several tracks for a long
> time now, as far as tuning. Orchestras and choirs are can work with
> 5 and 7 limit harmonies, but ET keyboards and guitars are
> Pythagorean in nature.

Not really, unless we are talking 53 equal or something of that sort.
17 is far from Pythagorean, as the fifth is *sharp* by four cents.

Music based on the the idea that the thirds
> are of the 6/5 and 5/4 character families is audibly dishonest and
> kitsch in the patently Pythagorean world of (fixed) 12-tET.

12-et, with fifths flattened by two cents, is a kind of intermediate
stage between Pythagorean and distinctly meantone tunings, but since
the thirds are treated as consonances, in terms of structural harmony
it is definately and decidedly a meantone system, and not Pythagorean.

> High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a thousand
> plus years, a part of the Western tradition.

Some of the time, but hardly always; 1/4 comma meantone gives exact 5/4s.

> You're right that the triads in 17 aren't decent- they're beautiful.

They simply do not work for music which sounds like common practice
music; a neo-Gothic approach like Margo's makes a lot more sense if
you want to relate it to historical Western practice, or you could try
to relate it to Arabic practice. 34 can't do the chord progressions of
common practice, but it can sound much like what people expect to hear.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Gene Ward Smith" <genewardsmith@...>
wrote:
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@> wrote:
>
> > The Western tradition has been running on several tracks for a
long
> > time now, as far as tuning. Orchestras and choirs are can work
with
> > 5 and 7 limit harmonies, but ET keyboards and guitars are
> > Pythagorean in nature.
>
> Not really, unless we are talking 53 equal or something of that
sort.
> 17 is far from Pythagorean, as the fifth is *sharp* by four cents.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Gene Ward Smith" <genewardsmith@...>
wrote:
> Not really, unless we are talking 53 equal or something of that
sort.

I'm talking about the character of the thirds. 400 cents is further
closer in character to 386 cents than it is to 408 cents? 300 cents
is closer in character to 316 cents than it is to 294 cents? Are you
trying to sell me bananas?

> 17 is far from Pythagorean, as the fifth is *sharp* by four cents.

The character of the thirds is an extravagent version of Pythagorean
thirds, as they compare to the most simple thirds. The character of
the fifth is bold and bright- going high retains that kind feeling,
whereas going down leaves the fifths to do more of a stability
thing.

> 12-et, with fifths flattened by two cents, is a kind of
>intermediate
> stage between Pythagorean and distinctly meantone tunings,

Yes of course. To the ear, not on paper, it smacks more of
Pythagorean tunings.

>but since
> the thirds are treated as consonances, in terms of structural
harmony
> it is definately and decidedly a meantone system, and not
>Pythagorean.

But the thirds in 12-tET are distant consonances (we're talking
fixed 12-tET of course). Treating them as if they were the closest
consonances is cornball, and sounds that way.

> "High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a
>thousand
> plus years, a part of the Western tradition."
> Some of the time, but hardly always; 1/4 comma meantone gives
>exact 5/4s.

Yes of course- as I said, Western music has been on several tracks as
far as tuning.

> They simply do not work for music which sounds like common practice
> music; a neo-Gothic approach like Margo's makes a lot more sense if
> you want to relate it to historical Western practice,

Certainly- I guess you didn't read another recent post of mine in
which I specifically expressed delight at having found Margo
Schulter's article at Medieval.org.

>or you could try to relate it to Arabic practice.

Also known as "sharing roots with Western practice" practice. In
this day and age, politically and socially speaking, the nodes where
Arabic/Persian and Western musical practices meet and branch can
hardly be beat as focal points for an artist.

>34 can't do the chord progressions of
> common practice, but it can sound much like what people expect to
>hear.

34 I haven't explored yet, but as I mentioned above I'd rather use
other tunings that focus on the areas where 17 is the weakest.

"What people expect" from 12-tET "common practice" is garbage- it
would be laughable if the social implications of such an audibly
dishonest music existing on such a scale weren't so ominous.

take care,

-Cameron Bobro

-Cameron Bobro

SNIP

>
> >or you could try to relate it to Arabic practice.
>
> Also known as "sharing roots with Western practice" practice. In
> this day and age, politically and socially speaking, the nodes where
> Arabic/Persian and Western musical practices meet and branch can
> hardly be beat as focal points for an artist.
>

What about us Turks then? Don't we have a say in the traditional multiethnic
Oriental Art otherwise delineated as Maqam Music?

To say nothing of Berbers, Moors, Kurds, Armenians, the lot...

The difficulty of being an Islamic Internationalist today!

Sad state of affairs...

Oz.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...> wrote:

>
> What about us Turks then? Don't we have a say in the traditional
multiethnic
> Oriental Art otherwise delineated as Maqam Music?
>
> To say nothing of Berbers, Moors, Kurds, Armenians, the lot...
>
> The difficulty of being an Islamic Internationalist today!
>
> Sad state of affairs...
>
> Oz.

Haha! Yes of course, don't get upset or the Georgians will be taking
you to task. Obviously the nearest "node" to where I live is
Turkish- in fact my studio is about 50 meters from a literal
border (castle wall) between the historical Catholic and Islamic
worlds. :-)

-Cameron Bobro

misterbobro wrote:

> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...> wrote:
>
>> What about us Turks then? Don't we have a say in the traditional
> multiethnic
>> Oriental Art otherwise delineated as Maqam Music?
>>
>> To say nothing of Berbers, Moors, Kurds, Armenians, the lot...
>>
>> The difficulty of being an Islamic Internationalist today!
>>
>> Sad state of affairs...
>>
>> Oz.
>
> Haha! Yes of course, don't get upset or the Georgians will be taking
> you to task. Obviously the nearest "node" to where I live is
> Turkish- in fact my studio is about 50 meters from a literal
> border (castle wall) between the historical Catholic and Islamic
> worlds. :-)

I've been meaning to ask if anyone here's studied Georgian choral music. I haven't heard very much (just some soundclips of the Rustavi Choir), but I know it's definitely not something that can be expressed in 12-TET.

~D.

> > You're right that the triads in 17 aren't decent- they're beautiful.
>
> They simply do not work for music which sounds like common practice
> music; a neo-Gothic approach like Margo's makes a lot more sense if
> you want to relate it to historical Western practice, or you could try
> to relate it to Arabic practice. 34 can't do the chord progressions of
> common practice, but it can sound much like what people expect to hear.

The 4:6:7 triads are pretty good, however.

-Carl

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:

> I still say that 17, as well as 19 and the obvious 24, is something
a novice
> should work with before going on to higher numbers.

The novice who doesn't care about being able to produce familiar
chords, maybe. 19, 22 and 31 seem like the obvious starting points to me.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@...> wrote:

> Made a 34, it dovetails into the 17 (49/48 inside of 25/24, those
> being the original building blocks). But... it also has big holes
> harmonically so I'd rather intertwine a completely different tuning-
> sleek modulation between very different tunings being the long-term
> goal.

It doesn't have septimal harmonies nearly as accurate as its 5-limit
harmonies. What it *does* have is septimal harmonies which work in a
familiar way. It has two 7/4s--a sharp version and a flat version. The
flat version supports keemun, but the sharp version supports pajara,
which means it works in the way we are familiar with--tempering out
50/49 and 64/63, and so using a dominant seventh chord as the otonal
tetrad. The septimal harmony is a considerable improvement on
12-equal, with a 7/4 of 988 cents, 19 cents sharp, instead of the only
partially recognizable 1000 cents of 12. The triads, of course, are
much better.

In a number of ways, therefore, 34 is friendly and familiar, the big
problem being that it isn't a meantone system.

> As far as live performance, at some point it would have to come
> down to setting the frets for a specific number of modes, so to
> speak. So the big tunings would be supersets live.

Which suggests using either pajara or keemun for selecting the subset.

Gene Ward Smith wrote:

> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:
>
>> I still say that 17, as well as 19 and the obvious 24, is something
> a novice
>> should work with before going on to higher numbers.
>
> The novice who doesn't care about being able to produce familiar
> chords, maybe. 19, 22 and 31 seem like the obvious starting points to me.

I'm thinking in terms of exoticism really, and I got interested in microtonalism for that reason. I'd recommend 22 and 31 (and 26, 29 etc.) after the others.

~D.

Carl Lumma wrote:

>> > You're right that the triads in 17 aren't decent- they're beautiful.

(I like how the original poster added the comment about big noses.)

>> They simply do not work for music which sounds like common practice
>> music; a neo-Gothic approach like Margo's makes a lot more sense if
>> you want to relate it to historical Western practice, or you could try
>> to relate it to Arabic practice. 34 can't do the chord progressions of
>> common practice, but it can sound much like what people expect to hear.
>
> The 4:6:7 triads are pretty good, however.

It also has a decent 6:7:9 and 12:14:18:21. The flats are septimal-flavored, especially the minor second, third and sixth.

~D.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@...> wrote:
>
> Music based on the the idea that the thirds
> are of the 6/5 and 5/4 character families is audibly dishonest and
> kitsch in the patently Pythagorean world of (fixed) 12-tET. (...)

Any specific examples? How can you tell what intonational idea a piece
is based on?

And where do the 5/4 or 6/5 character families begin or end?

> High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a thousand
> plus years, a part of the Western tradition.

What about the 16th and 17th centuries? That tradition got decisively
broken, didn't it?

~~~T~~~

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Tom Dent" <stringph@...> wrote:
>
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@> wrote:
> >
> > Music based on the the idea that the thirds
> > are of the 6/5 and 5/4 character families is audibly dishonest
and
> > kitsch in the patently Pythagorean world of (fixed) 12-tET. (...)
>
> Any specific examples?

Turn on the radio, go buy a CD. Find me on tune that is NOT an
example. Please.

Are you familiar with Autotune and retuning by resynthesis in
general? Retuning technology, and the skills of those using it, has
become very impressive- for the last couple of years I for one can
no longer instantly spot it by the artifacts. Engineers who use the
technology are of course most keen in this respect. But when every
note of a human voice is perfectly "in tune" with 12-tET, it's an
impossibility that has been achieved by retuning.

The "world music jazz electronica" or whatever it was I was
listening to last night at a friend's not only had the voice retuned,
but the flute and saxophone solos, too. On his superb hi-fi the
artifacts (minute "Cher-effect") were audible, but I can't hear them
in the same music in local coffee shop. However, the invariably
perfect unisons with the synthesizers give it away- and the fact
that the function of the chords sometimes simply disappears! It's
just some frequencies on top of each other in a pattern that's
recognizable through familiarity by repetition.

"Pop" music presents extreme examples, of course. But, it's a good
place to start examining the phenomenon of 12-tET in full effect,
because it can be so obvious.

Then go back, and out, through recorded time, listening for the
extent of conformity to strict 12-tET. We've got a good century to
examine in great detail. Anyone can hear the window of "in tune"
broadening as you go back.

>How can you tell what intonational idea a piece
> is based on?

One answer to that is, how can you NOT tell? How can you tell what
colors are in a painting?

The other answer to that is: there, you've just answered your own
questions, and explained why I say "dishonest and kitsch". If every
note, tune and kind of music is tuned EXACTLY THE SAME, there is no
way that intonational ideas are being honestly represented.

> And where do the 5/4 or 6/5 character families begin or end?

That can't be known exactly of course. For one thing, as soon as you
admit to the idea that intervals and harmonies have characters, you
have to consider timbre as well.

Number is adjective, not noun. The sixth partial in one instrument
may not bear the same relationship to the fifth partial and first
partial as it does in another instrument. So right off the bat we're
actually always talking about small regions.

And if we accept the idea of character, the character of the timbre
will also have its say- complementing or fighting with the interval.

And- wherever the character of 5/4, for example, begins and ends,
there must be a point where it clearly gives way to another region.
Especially if that region is strong both physically and
historically.

Even in our fuzzy stochastic world, to claim that 400 cents falls in
the region of 386 cents and not under 406 cents is humorous. Maybe
with a really heavy-handed timbre? Okay, I'll buy that. That means
we would need a very different timbre in order push
300 cents into the region of 6/5.

Great!

Whoops, that rules out pianos, organs, and pretty much every
instrument when played in the Western manner, which emphasizes
eveness of tone.

All of this isn't actually about 12-tET per se, it's about the idea
of one single "universal" tuning, a literal handful of frequencies
in the great scheme of things, representing every damn thing. THAT's
a cheesey and socially horrifying idea.

> > High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a
thousand
> > plus years, a part of the Western tradition.
>
> What about the 16th and 17th centuries? That tradition got
decisively
> broken, didn't it?

No it didn't. Folk musics carry all kinds of things on amazingly,
take a listen to the variety of intonational approaches in Balkan
music. Even the pentachordal ur-tradition was never broken, listen
to some Celtic music.

And of course you can't stop dope-smoking teenagers from getting to
the crux of things in some way or another-
countless kids with spider tattoos have been pounding out power
chords (fifths as a fundamental consonance) and "dark" minor thirds
for decades now. In other words, a simple intonational idea that
actually makes sense in 12-tET. Notice that this kind of teen music
began at the same time that the flexible orchesteral intonation
of "soft" popular music began to give way to strictly 12-tET
synthesizers and less flexible orchesteral intonation due to
electronic tuners and omnipresence of strictly tuned keyboard
instruments.

thank you for your time,

-Cameron Bobro

> > --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@> wrote:
> > >
> > > Music based on the the idea that the thirds
> > > are of the 6/5 and 5/4 character families is audibly dishonest
> and
> > > kitsch in the patently Pythagorean world of (fixed) 12-tET. (...)
> >
> > Any specific examples?
>
> Turn on the radio, go buy a CD. Find me on tune that is NOT an
> example. Please.

I listen to mainly classical radio and buy a lot of classical CDs, a
few jazz up to the 50's and 60's. I think most of the guys then knew
very well what they were doing. Of course there is a lot of kitsch in
the 19th century piano repertoire... but there is also excellent music.

'Find me one tune' ... Beethoven Waldstein sonata with the initial
major third resolving upwards? Bach Prelude in C# major with an
analogous progression?

> Are you familiar with Autotune and retuning by resynthesis in
> general? (...)

Yes, and I wouldn't knowingly buy anything which used it. I don't see
any big difference between electronically (re)tuning to 12tET versus
any other ET - all you're doing is inadequately compensating for the
performer's inability to hear / play / sing artistically satisfying
pitches.

> go back, and out, through recorded time, listening for the
> extent of conformity to strict 12-tET.

Not sure what this means. Listen to recordings going back through the
20th century? Good string quartets have never played 12tET (except in
Reger or Schoenberg), neither did Miles Davis. But pianists did.
What's the point here? Good composers and players always accounted for
the difficulty of combining tempered keyboards with other instruments,
and got round it somehow. No-one, at least not me, is saying that all
voices and instruments ought to have 12tET as their intonational ideal.

> > How can you tell what intonational idea a piece
> > is based on?
>
> One answer to that is, how can you NOT tell? How can you tell what
> colors are in a painting?

That doesn't explain anything. Your use of 'idea' seems to mean 'what
the composer or performer had in his/her mind's ear' rather than 'what
you actually hear'. You seem to be saying composers regularly imagined
a 5:4 third, despite writing for an instrument where the actual
interval is very different. Is the 'intonational idea' within the mind
of the composer or the ear of the listener? How can you tell what sort
of third a composer imagined?

> If every
> note, tune and kind of music is tuned EXACTLY THE SAME, there is no
> way that intonational ideas are being honestly represented.

But who is asking for 'every note to be tuned exactly the same'? Not
me. On the other hand, when you've got to play a piano recital, you
have to deal with the notes being fixed the entire time. Good pianists
and composers did so, good piano music is written differently from
choral or orchestral or string quartet music. (The same holds for jazz
piano versus other instruments...)

> Even in our fuzzy stochastic world, to claim that 400 cents falls in
> the region of 386 cents and not under 406 cents is humorous.

Straw man. Who is claiming that? And why must 400 cents be thought of
and heard as 'in the region' of some other, different interval? I can
hear the difference between 400 and 408, and in many contexts they
have importantly different musical characters. One of them works for
JS Bach and later keyboard composers, the other doesn't.

If you want to talk about Bach, it may be that he adapted his
composing style according to whether the thirds were slightly below or
above 400 in an irregular tuning. I don't think he was deaf or
dishonest or kitsch. Maybe even Chopin tuned unequally.

For someone who could exploit the differences between 392 and 400 and
404, lumping 400 and 408 together is also humorous.

> Whoops, that rules out pianos, organs, and pretty much every
> instrument when played in the Western manner (...)

... *if* you make the unwarranted assumption that keyboard composers
wanted or expected pure thirds and were deaf to the sounds their
instruments actually produced.

> > > High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a
> thousand
> > > plus years, a part of the Western tradition.
> >
> > What about the 16th and 17th centuries? (...)
>
> No it didn't. Folk musics carry all kinds of things on amazingly,
> take a listen to the variety of intonational approaches in Balkan
> music. Even the pentachordal ur-tradition was never broken, listen
> to some Celtic music.

Moving the goalposts. First you say 'Western tradition' - then when I
point out that Western tradition used meantone almost exclusively for
two centuries, you start talking about things outside that tradition.

The change from Pythagorean to meantone around 1500 was real and
fundamental, so was the later change in keyboards from meantone to
equal-tempered, and good composers and players reacted to the changes
accordingly. So who are you calling dishonest?

If your attack is aimed at present-day pop record producers then I say
fire at will - but I don't think all of Western keyboard-based music
from the mid-18th century through the 20th deserves the same condemnation.

~~~T~~~

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Tom Dent" <stringph@...> wrote:
>
>
> > > --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "misterbobro" <misterbobro@>
wrote:
> > > >
> > > > Music based on the the idea that the thirds
> > > > are of the 6/5 and 5/4 character families is audibly
dishonest
> > and
> > > > kitsch in the patently Pythagorean world of (fixed) 12-tET.
(...)
> > >
> > > Any specific examples?
> >
> > Turn on the radio, go buy a CD. Find me on tune that is NOT an
> > example. Please.
>
> I listen to mainly classical radio and buy a lot of classical CDs,
a
> few jazz up to the 50's and 60's. I think most of the guys then
knew
> very well what they were doing. Of course there is a lot of kitsch
in
> the 19th century piano repertoire... but there is also excellent
music.
>
> 'Find me one tune' ... Beethoven Waldstein sonata with the initial
> major third resolving upwards? Bach Prelude in C# major with an
> analogous progression?

I keep forgetting that on the Internet things need to spelled out-
obviously "find me one example, please" has a "smiley", as I also
gave an example of a very popular contemporary music that I consider
quite true to 12-tET as far as the nature of the thirds and fifths
(whatever other artistic values the music might or might not have).

>
>
> > Are you familiar with Autotune and retuning by resynthesis in
> > general? (...)
>
> Yes, and I wouldn't knowingly buy anything which used it. I don't
see
> any big difference between electronically (re)tuning to 12tET
versus
> any other ET -

As I said, it's not all about 12-tET per se, it's the idea ONE
tuning "representing" an infinite range of possibilities. It would
be just as bad to strap intonation to any other Procrustean bed.

>all you're doing is inadequately compensating for the
> performer's inability to hear / play / sing artistically satisfying
> pitches.

It's about complete and utter conformity to an artificial system.

> > go back, and out, through recorded time, listening for the
> > extent of conformity to strict 12-tET.
>
> Not sure what this means. Listen to recordings going back through
the
> 20th century? Good string quartets have never played 12tET (except
in
> Reger or Schoenberg), neither did Miles Davis.

Of course not, and it's by going back, and out, through recorded
history, just as I said, that you and I know this.

>But pianists did.

And a huge amount of music played on the piano sounds silly for that
reason. A piece built to rest on a serene major triad sounds like a
theatrical representation of itself when there isn't a single truly
serene major triad in sight.

> What's the point here? Good composers and players always accounted
>for the difficulty of combining tempered keyboards with other
>instruments, and got round it somehow.

Of course. And that's just a subset of the age-old challenge of
combining fixed pitches of any kind with supple pitches. The point
is that slapping a straighjacket on the supple pitches is a bad
solution.

>No-one, at least not me, is saying that all
> voices and instruments ought to have 12tET as their intonational
ideal.

Well we're in complete agreement.

> > > How can you tell what intonational idea a piece
> > > is based on?> >
> > One answer to that is, how can you NOT tell? How can you tell
>what
> > colors are in a painting?
> That doesn't explain anything. Your use of 'idea' seems to
>mean 'what
> the composer or performer had in his/her mind's ear' rather
>than 'what
> you actually hear'.

Not at all- in fact, if you see an earlier post of mine on one of
the tuning groups, in a thread about being in or out of tune, I
specifically state my belief that the composer and performer are the
only ones who actually know if something is as it was intended to
be.

I'm talking about "what we hear". Every artist must face the fact
that whatever their original intent, a piece takes on a life of its
own, both self-referentially and in relationship with other people.
A Post-Modernist would probably disagree, but I believe that an
artwork contains and displays its own truths- we can judge it
against itself.

>You seem to be saying composers regularly imagined
> a 5:4 third, despite writing for an instrument where the actual
> interval is very different. Is the 'intonational idea' within the
>mind
> of the composer or the ear of the listener? How can you tell what
>sort
> of third a composer imagined?

Man I say "black black" and you say "hey you keep saying white..."

I thought I made it clear that composers obviously imagine all kinds
of thirds, and all kinds of thirds take on a life of their own and
demand identity in a work. 5/4 was just an example.

The whole point is, there are many thirds imagined, evident,
implied, and on their way in the mail- not just one! That's what
makes using ONE interval to represent them all ludicrous.

5/4 vs. 81/64 vs. infinite shadings on either side is just a glaring
example

> > If every
> > note, tune and kind of music is tuned EXACTLY THE SAME, there is
>no
> > way that intonational ideas are being honestly represented.
>
> But who is asking for 'every note to be tuned exactly the same'?

Asking? It's just done, on a massive scale- noone asked me...

>Not me.

...nor you.

>On the other hand, when you've got to play a piano recital, you
> have to deal with the notes being fixed the entire time. Good
>pianists and composers did so, good piano music is written
>differently from choral or orchestral or string quartet music. (The
>same holds for jazz piano versus other instruments...)

I completely agree. Would you also agree that it's usually
transcriptions that are most likely to sound kitschy on a piano? If
so, then we actually probably don't have anything to argue about,
except a matter of degree. (To my ears, Beethoven can fly in 12-tET
but Bach not, etc.).
>
>
> > Even in our fuzzy stochastic world, to claim that 400 cents
falls in
> > the region of 386 cents and not under 406 cents is humorous.
>
> Straw man. Who is claiming that?

Grab an armful of music theory books and take a thought as to what
lies underneath so many "rules" we all learned in school.

>And why must 400 cents be thought of
> and heard as 'in the region' of some other, different interval?

It shouldn't, don't you read what I write? Perhaps I'm a crappy
writer, I'll admit. I don't believe that intervals inherently
represent other, simpler intervals (as I've said before- I call it
the "justification" of intervals). It's a complex subject.

Obviously I believe in an interval being first and foremost simply
what it is (I use higher primes and ratios in tunings), but balance
this with the physical reality that a singer for example may very
well sing the nearest simpler interval. This is why I said, for
example, that 11 and 23 are the soulmates of 17. You can make an
almost-equal 17 tone tuning using the prime 23, and those relatively
complex intervals are, to my ears, simply what they are,
neither "equal" nor approximations of simpler intervals (so I sweat
to make them precise). On the other hand, the reality is that
intervals also can, and do, have multiple identities, and a singer
singing 14/11 when the keyboard is playing some complex ratio a
couple of cents higher is groovy.

>I can
> hear the difference between 400 and 408, and in many contexts they
> have importantly different musical characters.

Certainly.
>
> If you want to talk about Bach, it may be that he adapted his
> composing style according to whether the thirds were slightly
below or
> above 400 in an irregular tuning. I don't think he was deaf or
> dishonest or kitsch. Maybe even Chopin tuned unequally.

Of course! Dishonest or kitsch is the opposite of that, as I keep
repeating.

>
> For someone who could exploit the differences between 392 and 400
and
> 404, lumping 400 and 408 together is also humorous.

Yes. Sometimes I stress about the difference between 704.8 and
705.3, other times it doesn't matter, like everyone here I imagine.
It's the mindless "lumping" that's the problem.

> > Whoops, that rules out pianos, organs, and pretty much every
> > instrument when played in the Western manner (...)
>
> ... *if* you make the unwarranted assumption that keyboard
>composers
> wanted or expected pure thirds and were deaf to the sounds their
> instruments actually produced.

I don't make that assumption- I make the assumption that composers
want ALL KINDS of thirds, and whatever they want, different musics
take on a life of their own and "want" different thirds.

I was refering to creating character through timbre, in other words,
depending on tone color to express interval character, which
obviously requires multiple timbres for multiple intervals. The
point of this was to illustrate that on instruments with even
timbres, this is a very limited option.

> > > > High M3s and low m3s are today, and have been for what, a
> > thousand
> > > > plus years, a part of the Western tradition.
> > >
> > > What about the 16th and 17th centuries? (...)
> >
> > No it didn't. Folk musics carry all kinds of things on
amazingly,
> > take a listen to the variety of intonational approaches in
Balkan
> > music. Even the pentachordal ur-tradition was never broken,
listen
> > to some Celtic music.
>
> Moving the goalposts. First you say 'Western tradition' - then
>when I
> point out that Western tradition used meantone almost exclusively
>for
> two centuries, you start talking about things outside that
tradition.

Now that's just silly. Ireland is further west than Vienna. :-) Or
by "Western tradition" do you mean specific ethnic groups of
specific social status in specific places in the Western world?
That's a fundamental non-understanding of what the "Western" world
was and is.

> The change from Pythagorean to meantone around 1500 was real and
> fundamental, so was the later change in keyboards from meantone to
> equal-tempered, and good composers and players reacted to the
changes accordingly. So who are you calling dishonest?

I'm calling dishonest the music of those who DIDN'T and DON'T react
to the changes. Which is a whole lot of music. WHOM am I calling
dishonest? No-one, I don't pretend to know intentions. I called the
MUSIC dishonest.

>
> but I don't think all of Western keyboard-based >music
> from the mid-18th century through the 20th deserves the same
>condemnation.

Certainly not- as I said before, transcriptions are most
susceptible. If it's 12-tET meant to be 12-tET and not pretending to
be something else far away, that's not kitsch of course. Schoenberg
is wonderful, I agree.

-Cameron Bobro

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:

> In my own keyboard design, which adds a third row of "red keys",
five per
> octave in front of the white keys and usually played with the thumb,
the
> lower row plays the half-flats.

http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c348/mireut/zumpe.jpg

Maybe you didn't see this one before, (http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/
group/makemicromusic/message/13178) it's from "The Pianoforte" by
Rosamond Harding. I like the fake keys. In "Broadwood by Appointment"
David Wainwright quotes James Shudi Broadwood about Zumpe, that "on
his return from Germany, where he had been to visit his relations,
bought back with him the first of these instruments [pianos] seen in
England, and about the years 1768 or 1769, began to make them." I
wonder if there are any drawings from when it was worked on. Hawkes
piano was supposed to have 17 notes, but shifted something internally
for the sharp keys (J. Jousse, An Essay on Temperament. London, 1832)

Clark

threesixesinarow wrote:

> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Danny Wier" <dawiertx@...> wrote:
>
>> In my own keyboard design, which adds a third row of "red keys",
> five per
>> octave in front of the white keys and usually played with the thumb,
> the
>> lower row plays the half-flats.
>
> http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c348/mireut/zumpe.jpg

I think I've seen that design or similar, or at least heard of it, and thanks for reminding me.

The guy whose first name was Naguib offset the shorter and taller black keys to the right a little. Since he designed the piano for Arabic music, he most likely intended these to play half-flats. There was a real piano made; it wasn't just an illustration of an idea.

If/when I get a chance to go to the fine arts library at U. of Texas soon, I'll get more info.

~D.

That's nice to know Cameron. Say, is that a feminine name? If so, you are
the second woman I get to meet on the tuning list.

Cordially,
Oz.

----- Original Message -----
From: "misterbobro" <misterbobro@yahoo.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: 13 Ekim 2006 Cuma 13:35
Subject: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...> wrote:
>
> >
> > What about us Turks then? Don't we have a say in the traditional
> multiethnic
> > Oriental Art otherwise delineated as Maqam Music?
> >
> > To say nothing of Berbers, Moors, Kurds, Armenians, the lot...
> >
> > The difficulty of being an Islamic Internationalist today!
> >
> > Sad state of affairs...
> >
> > Oz.
>
>
> Haha! Yes of course, don't get upset or the Georgians will be taking
> you to task. Obviously the nearest "node" to where I live is
> Turkish- in fact my studio is about 50 meters from a literal
> border (castle wall) between the historical Catholic and Islamic
> worlds. :-)
>
> -Cameron Bobro
>
>

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...> wrote:
>
> That's nice to know Cameron. Say, is that a feminine name? If so,
> you are the second woman I get to meet on the tuning list.
>
> Cordially,
> Oz.

Hey Cameron, I googled you and found:

http://cdbaby.com/cd/kosmolith2

I didn't know you had this! Do tell (this is you, right?).
The kosmolith website is apparently down at the moment.

-Carl

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Carl Lumma" <clumma@...> wrote:
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@> wrote:
> >
> > That's nice to know Cameron. Say, is that a feminine name? If so,
> > you are the second woman I get to meet on the tuning list.
> >
> > Cordially,
> > Oz.
>
> Hey Cameron, I googled you and found:
>
> http://cdbaby.com/cd/kosmolith2
>
> I didn't know you had this! Do tell (this is you, right?).
> The kosmolith website is apparently down at the moment.
>
> -Carl
>

Haha! or YoHoHo! I had almost forgotten about that, recorded in 2001-
after that I got fed up with 12-tET. come to think of it, there's
some freeform intonation (aka deliberately out of tune) on there
that I liked a lot.

Ozan- sorry I'm just a stinky hairy old guy like most of us here,
probably. :-)

-Cameron Bobro

Stinky hairy ol' guy you say? Would that perchance make me the bigfoot? LOL

Interesting CD on 'slave trade', if I got that right. Which piece would you
recommend as best?

Oz.

----- Original Message -----
From: "misterbobro" <misterbobro@yahoo.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: 26 Ekim 2006 Per�embe 3:33
Subject: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Carl Lumma" <clumma@...> wrote:
> >
> > --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@> wrote:
> > >
> > > That's nice to know Cameron. Say, is that a feminine name? If so,
> > > you are the second woman I get to meet on the tuning list.
> > >
> > > Cordially,
> > > Oz.
> >
> > Hey Cameron, I googled you and found:
> >
> > http://cdbaby.com/cd/kosmolith2
> >
> > I didn't know you had this! Do tell (this is you, right?).
> > The kosmolith website is apparently down at the moment.
> >
> > -Carl
> >
>
> Haha! or YoHoHo! I had almost forgotten about that, recorded in 2001-
> after that I got fed up with 12-tET. come to think of it, there's
> some freeform intonation (aka deliberately out of tune) on there
> that I liked a lot.
>
> Ozan- sorry I'm just a stinky hairy old guy like most of us here,
> probably. :-)
>
> -Cameron Bobro
>

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...> wrote:
>
> Stinky hairy ol' guy you say? Would that perchance make me the
bigfoot? LOL
>
> Interesting CD on 'slave trade', if I got that right. Which piece
would you
> recommend as best?
>
> Oz.

The best song is Little Island off the Coast (when I was kid our plane
ran out of fuel over the Atlantic and made an emergency landing on a
tiny former slaving island off the coast of Angola- Mussulo, I
believe). But I'm going to redo the song with more appropriate tunings
and rhythms (odd as they are in the original).

-Bobro

> when I was kid our plane ran out of fuel over the Atlantic
> and made an emergency landing on a tiny former slaving island
> off the coast of Angola- Mussulo, I believe).

Really!?!

-Carl

Hi Oz,
On a 15 fret guitar with 6 strings, how many possible different notes or semitones are there.
Is it 39 notes or much more.? I play the violin.
Vitally.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@ozanyarman.com>
To: "Tuning List" <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, October 21, 2006 4:57 AM
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> That's nice to know Cameron. Say, is that a feminine name? If so, you are
> the second woman I get to meet on the tuning list.
>
> Cordially,
> Oz.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "misterbobro" <misterbobro@yahoo.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: 13 Ekim 2006 Cuma 13:35
> Subject: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................
>
>
>> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> > What about us Turks then? Don't we have a say in the traditional
>> multiethnic
>> > Oriental Art otherwise delineated as Maqam Music?
>> >
>> > To say nothing of Berbers, Moors, Kurds, Armenians, the lot...
>> >
>> > The difficulty of being an Islamic Internationalist today!
>> >
>> > Sad state of affairs...
>> >
>> > Oz.
>>
>>
>> Haha! Yes of course, don't get upset or the Georgians will be taking
>> you to task. Obviously the nearest "node" to where I live is
>> Turkish- in fact my studio is about 50 meters from a literal
>> border (castle wall) between the historical Catholic and Islamic
>> worlds. :-)
>>
>> -Cameron Bobro
>>
>>
>
>
>
> You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to one
> of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the list):
> tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual emails.
> tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>

Do you mean by a 15 fret guitar, that there are "15 frets per octave" or
just 15 frets in total?

In the first case, there will obviously be 15 different notes per string,
which will be seperated by "semitones" (I am freely assuming that you mean
any interval sized 70 to 120 cents) only if the frets are either log-equally
or specially distributed across the fretboard. Add to this the possibility
of tuning the strings outside the constraints of such a fixed setting, not
to mention contorting frets under each string to grotesque shapes, the
answer to your question retreats into obscurity. Under extreme
circumstances, you may be able to achieve dozens of distinct "semitones"
(per octave) of diverse sizes from all strings.

In the latter case, the possibility to achieve semitonal intervals diminish
to nil, unless you are willing to allow large gaps on the fretboard when
placing the frets.

Since there are innumerable ways of installing and contorting the frets, you
need to specify your wishes aforehand.

In the case of 15-EDO fretting, given a compass of 3 and half octaves, you
can sound as many as 53-55 notes from your guitar.

Is this a trick question? Did I pass?

LOL

----- Original Message -----
From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@rogers.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: 26 Ekim 2006 Per�embe 8:53
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> Hi Oz,
> On a 15 fret guitar with 6 strings, how many possible different notes or
> semitones are there.
> Is it 39 notes or much more.? I play the violin.
> Vitally.
>

No , it was no trick question.
As a fiddler in Old Tyme Music, two Centuries of tunes in North America was played in different tunings on their fiddle/violin.
The standardising element was the introduction of the 88 key piano.
Then every fiddler had to tune their instrument to it and GDAE. I tune mine alternately to AEAE too.
Now the Guitar can be tuned to different alternate tunings too, I know.
The part I was wondering is that, how many tones I could get from a standard guitar that has 15 frets, taking in consideration that it will overlap at the head of the guitar 5 strings in 4ths and one string in 3rds. I don't know if I am explaining myself correctly, but I know you can understand me. We are talking about the regular standard guitar.
Vitally.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@ozanyarman.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, October 27, 2006 12:02 AM
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> Do you mean by a 15 fret guitar, that there are "15 frets per octave" or
> just 15 frets in total?
>
> In the first case, there will obviously be 15 different notes per string,
> which will be seperated by "semitones" (I am freely assuming that you mean
> any interval sized 70 to 120 cents) only if the frets are either > log-equally
> or specially distributed across the fretboard. Add to this the possibility
> of tuning the strings outside the constraints of such a fixed setting, not
> to mention contorting frets under each string to grotesque shapes, the
> answer to your question retreats into obscurity. Under extreme
> circumstances, you may be able to achieve dozens of distinct "semitones"
> (per octave) of diverse sizes from all strings.
>
> In the latter case, the possibility to achieve semitonal intervals > diminish
> to nil, unless you are willing to allow large gaps on the fretboard when
> placing the frets.
>
> Since there are innumerable ways of installing and contorting the frets, > you
> need to specify your wishes aforehand.
>
> In the case of 15-EDO fretting, given a compass of 3 and half octaves, you
> can sound as many as 53-55 notes from your guitar.
>
> Is this a trick question? Did I pass?
>
> LOL
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@rogers.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: 26 Ekim 2006 Per�embe 8:53
> Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves > microtones.......................
>
>
>> Hi Oz,
>> On a 15 fret guitar with 6 strings, how many possible different notes or
>> semitones are there.
>> Is it 39 notes or much more.? I play the violin.
>> Vitally.
>>
>
>
>
> You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to one
> of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the list):
> tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual emails.
> tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>

Oz.
Thank you for the explanation.
Vitally.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@ozanyarman.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Friday, October 27, 2006 12:02 AM
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> Do you mean by a 15 fret guitar, that there are "15 frets per octave" or
> just 15 frets in total?
>
> In the first case, there will obviously be 15 different notes per string,
> which will be seperated by "semitones" (I am freely assuming that you mean
> any interval sized 70 to 120 cents) only if the frets are either > log-equally
> or specially distributed across the fretboard. Add to this the possibility
> of tuning the strings outside the constraints of such a fixed setting, not
> to mention contorting frets under each string to grotesque shapes, the
> answer to your question retreats into obscurity. Under extreme
> circumstances, you may be able to achieve dozens of distinct "semitones"
> (per octave) of diverse sizes from all strings.
>
> In the latter case, the possibility to achieve semitonal intervals > diminish
> to nil, unless you are willing to allow large gaps on the fretboard when
> placing the frets.
>
> Since there are innumerable ways of installing and contorting the frets, > you
> need to specify your wishes aforehand.
>
> In the case of 15-EDO fretting, given a compass of 3 and half octaves, you
> can sound as many as 53-55 notes from your guitar.
>
> Is this a trick question? Did I pass?
>
> LOL
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@rogers.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: 26 Ekim 2006 Per�embe 8:53
> Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves > microtones.......................
>
>
>> Hi Oz,
>> On a 15 fret guitar with 6 strings, how many possible different notes or
>> semitones are there.
>> Is it 39 notes or much more.? I play the violin.
>> Vitally.
>>
>
>
>
> You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to one
> of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the list):
> tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual emails.
> tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>

Microtonal guitarists like Neil Haverstick will surely know better than I.

Cordially,
Oz.

----- Original Message -----
From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@rogers.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: 27 Ekim 2006 Cuma 18:19
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> No , it was no trick question.
> As a fiddler in Old Tyme Music, two Centuries of tunes in North America
was
> played in different tunings on their fiddle/violin.
> The standardising element was the introduction of the 88 key piano.
> Then every fiddler had to tune their instrument to it and GDAE. I tune
mine
> alternately to AEAE too.
> Now the Guitar can be tuned to different alternate tunings too, I know.
> The part I was wondering is that, how many tones I could get from a
standard
> guitar that has 15 frets, taking in consideration that it will overlap at
> the head of the guitar 5 strings in 4ths and one string in 3rds. I don't
> know if I am explaining myself correctly, but I know you can understand
me.
> We are talking about the regular standard guitar.
> Vitally.
>

Thanks again.
Is he in this list? Maybe he can answer.
Are there frets the shape of an "S" and why?
Vitally.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@ozanyarman.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 7:54 AM
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> Microtonal guitarists like Neil Haverstick will surely know better than I.
>
> Cordially,
> Oz.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@rogers.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: 27 Ekim 2006 Cuma 18:19
> Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves > microtones.......................
>
>
>> No , it was no trick question.
>> As a fiddler in Old Tyme Music, two Centuries of tunes in North America
> was
>> played in different tunings on their fiddle/violin.
>> The standardising element was the introduction of the 88 key piano.
>> Then every fiddler had to tune their instrument to it and GDAE. I tune
> mine
>> alternately to AEAE too.
>> Now the Guitar can be tuned to different alternate tunings too, I know.
>> The part I was wondering is that, how many tones I could get from a
> standard
>> guitar that has 15 frets, taking in consideration that it will overlap at
>> the head of the guitar 5 strings in 4ths and one string in 3rds. I don't
>> know if I am explaining myself correctly, but I know you can understand
> me.
>> We are talking about the regular standard guitar.
>> Vitally.
>>
>
>
>
> You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to one
> of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the list):
> tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual emails.
> tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>

He well may.

I wouldn't know much about the frets though, have just seen jagged shapes
installed somewhere on the web.

----- Original Message -----
From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@rogers.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: 28 Ekim 2006 Cumartesi 22:19
Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> Thanks again.
> Is he in this list? Maybe he can answer.
> Are there frets the shape of an "S" and why?
> Vitally.
>
>
>

Hi Vital,

I have done some re-fretting of guitars. But, I'm not really sure
what it is you're trying to accomplish. If the goal is to have a
guitar be able to play specific pitches, there are many ways to go
about accomplishing that. You have to first decide which pitches
you're trying to hit. Fret placement is a pretty exact science. You
might want to check out the Links section in this group and have a
wander around some of the sites. There are several popular equal
temperaments in use other than 12 tone equal, including, but not
limited to,17,19,22,31,53, and 72. There are also guitars which
don't have frets straight across the neck, and guitars which have
unqual spacing of frets. There are pros and cons to all of the
methods.

Good luck. I'd be happy to try to answer any questions or point you
in the right direction.

Regards,

Robin

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@...> wrote:
>
> Thanks again.
> Is he in this list? Maybe he can answer.
> Are there frets the shape of an "S" and why?
> Vitally.
>
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 7:54 AM
> Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
microtones.......................
>
>
> > Microtonal guitarists like Neil Haverstick will surely know
better than I.
> >
> > Cordially,
> > Oz.
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@...>
> > To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> > Sent: 27 Ekim 2006 Cuma 18:19
> > Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
> > microtones.......................
> >
> >
> >> No , it was no trick question.
> >> As a fiddler in Old Tyme Music, two Centuries of tunes in North
America
> > was
> >> played in different tunings on their fiddle/violin.
> >> The standardising element was the introduction of the 88 key
piano.
> >> Then every fiddler had to tune their instrument to it and GDAE.
I tune
> > mine
> >> alternately to AEAE too.
> >> Now the Guitar can be tuned to different alternate tunings too,
I know.
> >> The part I was wondering is that, how many tones I could get
from a
> > standard
> >> guitar that has 15 frets, taking in consideration that it will
overlap at
> >> the head of the guitar 5 strings in 4ths and one string in
3rds. I don't
> >> know if I am explaining myself correctly, but I know you can
understand
> > me.
> >> We are talking about the regular standard guitar.
> >> Vitally.
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to
one
> > of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the
list):
> > tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> > tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> > tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> > tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> > tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual
emails.
> > tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
> >
> > Yahoo! Groups Links
> >
> >
> >
> >
>

Robin,
Thanks,
At the moment I am learning, and I don't know what I want yet.
I replaced the fingerboard of my pot-belly mandolin to a fretless one.
I am lucky in the sense that I don't need a fret for perfect pitch.
Others rely to much on frets.
Depending on your mood, the music takes different directions and intonations.
I may not know 17,19,22,31,53, and 72 , but probably I may have used it without knowing.
Vitally.

----- Original Message ----- From: "Robin Perry" <jinto83@yahoo.com>
To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 4:32 PM
Subject: [tuning] Re: everybody loves microtones.......................

> Hi Vital,
>
> I have done some re-fretting of guitars. But, I'm not really sure
> what it is you're trying to accomplish. If the goal is to have a
> guitar be able to play specific pitches, there are many ways to go
> about accomplishing that. You have to first decide which pitches
> you're trying to hit. Fret placement is a pretty exact science. You
> might want to check out the Links section in this group and have a
> wander around some of the sites. There are several popular equal
> temperaments in use other than 12 tone equal, including, but not
> limited to,17,19,22,31,53, and 72. There are also guitars which
> don't have frets straight across the neck, and guitars which have
> unqual spacing of frets. There are pros and cons to all of the
> methods.
>
> Good luck. I'd be happy to try to answer any questions or point you
> in the right direction.
>
> Regards,
>
> Robin
>
>
>
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@...> wrote:
>>
>> Thanks again.
>> Is he in this list? Maybe he can answer.
>> Are there frets the shape of an "S" and why?
>> Vitally.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- >> From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@...>
>> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
>> Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 7:54 AM
>> Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
> microtones.......................
>>
>>
>> > Microtonal guitarists like Neil Haverstick will surely know
> better than I.
>> >
>> > Cordially,
>> > Oz.
>> >
>> > ----- Original Message -----
>> > From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@...>
>> > To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
>> > Sent: 27 Ekim 2006 Cuma 18:19
>> > Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
>> > microtones.......................
>> >
>> >
>> >> No , it was no trick question.
>> >> As a fiddler in Old Tyme Music, two Centuries of tunes in North
> America
>> > was
>> >> played in different tunings on their fiddle/violin.
>> >> The standardising element was the introduction of the 88 key
> piano.
>> >> Then every fiddler had to tune their instrument to it and GDAE.
> I tune
>> > mine
>> >> alternately to AEAE too.
>> >> Now the Guitar can be tuned to different alternate tunings too,
> I know.
>> >> The part I was wondering is that, how many tones I could get
> from a
>> > standard
>> >> guitar that has 15 frets, taking in consideration that it will
> overlap at
>> >> the head of the guitar 5 strings in 4ths and one string in
> 3rds. I don't
>> >> know if I am explaining myself correctly, but I know you can
> understand
>> > me.
>> >> We are talking about the regular standard guitar.
>> >> Vitally.
>> >>
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> > You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to
> one
>> > of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the
> list):
>> > tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
>> > tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
>> > tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
>> > tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
>> > tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual
> emails.
>> > tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
>> >
>> > Yahoo! Groups Links
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>
>
>
>
>
> You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to one
> of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the list):
> tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual emails.
> tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>

Vitally,

I agree. You are very lucky to be able to play without frets. I
have been scratching my head lately trying to work out ways to make
guitars and other instruments more fiddle and trombone-like in their
flexibility. I made a 31 equal temperament guitar fret board, put
it on the guitar, and soon realized that I'd never be able to master
the thing. There were just too many frets. I'm sure that better
guitarists would have better luck, but, it was too difficult for me.

Of course, with guitars, playing chords without frets is more than a
little tricky. You have to settle for some sort of open tuning and
use a slide or be very, very good at fingering six strings
simultaneously. On the higher end pedal steel guitars you can
change tunings on the fly with a pedal. Maybe there is a way to rig
a whammy bar to accomplish something similar with a standard
guitar? These are just some ideas bouncing around in my head.

Good luck in your tuning adventure.

Robin

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@...> wrote:
>
> Robin,
> Thanks,
> At the moment I am learning, and I don't know what I want yet.
> I replaced the fingerboard of my pot-belly mandolin to a fretless
one.
> I am lucky in the sense that I don't need a fret for perfect pitch.
> Others rely to much on frets.
> Depending on your mood, the music takes different directions and
> intonations.
> I may not know 17,19,22,31,53, and 72 , but probably I may have
used it
> without knowing.
> Vitally.
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Robin Perry" <jinto83@...>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 4:32 PM
> Subject: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
microtones.......................
>
>
> > Hi Vital,
> >
> > I have done some re-fretting of guitars. But, I'm not really
sure
> > what it is you're trying to accomplish. If the goal is to have a
> > guitar be able to play specific pitches, there are many ways to
go
> > about accomplishing that. You have to first decide which pitches
> > you're trying to hit. Fret placement is a pretty exact science.
You
> > might want to check out the Links section in this group and have
a
> > wander around some of the sites. There are several popular equal
> > temperaments in use other than 12 tone equal, including, but not
> > limited to,17,19,22,31,53, and 72. There are also guitars which
> > don't have frets straight across the neck, and guitars which have
> > unqual spacing of frets. There are pros and cons to all of the
> > methods.
> >
> > Good luck. I'd be happy to try to answer any questions or point
you
> > in the right direction.
> >
> > Regards,
> >
> > Robin
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@> wrote:
> >>
> >> Thanks again.
> >> Is he in this list? Maybe he can answer.
> >> Are there frets the shape of an "S" and why?
> >> Vitally.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> ----- Original Message -----
> >> From: "Ozan Yarman" <ozanyarman@>
> >> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> >> Sent: Saturday, October 28, 2006 7:54 AM
> >> Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
> > microtones.......................
> >>
> >>
> >> > Microtonal guitarists like Neil Haverstick will surely know
> > better than I.
> >> >
> >> > Cordially,
> >> > Oz.
> >> >
> >> > ----- Original Message -----
> >> > From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@>
> >> > To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> >> > Sent: 27 Ekim 2006 Cuma 18:19
> >> > Subject: Re: [tuning] Re: everybody loves
> >> > microtones.......................
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >> No , it was no trick question.
> >> >> As a fiddler in Old Tyme Music, two Centuries of tunes in
North
> > America
> >> > was
> >> >> played in different tunings on their fiddle/violin.
> >> >> The standardising element was the introduction of the 88 key
> > piano.
> >> >> Then every fiddler had to tune their instrument to it and
GDAE.
> > I tune
> >> > mine
> >> >> alternately to AEAE too.
> >> >> Now the Guitar can be tuned to different alternate tunings
too,
> > I know.
> >> >> The part I was wondering is that, how many tones I could get
> > from a
> >> > standard
> >> >> guitar that has 15 frets, taking in consideration that it
will
> > overlap at
> >> >> the head of the guitar 5 strings in 4ths and one string in
> > 3rds. I don't
> >> >> know if I am explaining myself correctly, but I know you can
> > understand
> >> > me.
> >> >> We are talking about the regular standard guitar.
> >> >> Vitally.
> >> >>
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> > You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email
to
> > one
> >> > of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the
> > list):
> >> > tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> >> > tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> >> > tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> >> > tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily
digests.
> >> > tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual
> > emails.
> >> > tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help
information.
> >> >
> >> > Yahoo! Groups Links
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > You can configure your subscription by sending an empty email to
one
> > of these addresses (from the address at which you receive the
list):
> > tuning-subscribe@yahoogroups.com - join the tuning group.
> > tuning-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com - leave the group.
> > tuning-nomail@yahoogroups.com - turn off mail from the group.
> > tuning-digest@yahoogroups.com - set group to send daily digests.
> > tuning-normal@yahoogroups.com - set group to send individual
emails.
> > tuning-help@yahoogroups.com - receive general help information.
> >
> > Yahoo! Groups Links
> >
> >
> >
> >
>

From: "VITAL ALTCHEH" <alcher@...>

> Robin,
> Thanks,
> At the moment I am learning, and I don't know what I want yet.
> I replaced the fingerboard of my pot-belly mandolin to a fretless one.
> I am lucky in the sense that I don't need a fret for perfect pitch.
> Others rely to much on frets.
> Depending on your mood, the music takes different directions and
> intonations.
> I may not know 17,19,22,31,53, and 72 , but probably I may have used it
> without knowing.
> Vitally.

I have got to hear that fretless mandolin now; got any recordings of it?

I bought a really cheap 5-string banjo a while back, defretted it, debated with myself whether to give the fretboard a few coats of epoxy (like Jaco Pastorius did with his basses) or tie some frets to it in 17-tone unequal. I opted for the former, and I still need to work out the buzz, but it works pretty well with metal strings. I don't tune it conventionally; rather I use tenor banjo strings and the short string and tune it d'-a-d-G from top to bottom. It sounds a little like a C�mb�s saz.

Playing chords would be an obvious issue, but I tend to use simpler chords and droning open strings a lot anyway.

~D.