Noob Blunders In

Hello Microtonal Heads,
I've been lurking on your list for a mere couple of weeks, scratching
my head over the usual suspects: 5 figure ratios, special list jargon
and so on. However, I have a big thanks to offer to y'all for
pointing me to the ideas of Harry Partch, and the tidbit of
information that his ideas inform a lot of microtonal activity. I
didn't get, before, that microtonal experiments with all the arcane
math that you guys swap like marbles might be related to making
better use of the high harmonics beyond 12-et's possibilities. This
possibility has been bugging me for years on a merely personal
daydream level.

(There's a great violinist in my town, a classical player turned to
improvisation, and I hear him doing cool things with his upper
harmonics quite frequently, and although I don't know how he
conceives what he's doing, the sound is for real.) Yours truly is a
very commercial musician making a living playing a conventionally
tuned guitar, and beyond bending a string here and there, I'm pretty
locked into a 12-et theoretical world (even though as must be fairly
obvious, a guitar has its own peculiar temper).

So are there any of you who actually put your microtonal skills to
work in any kind of working band "Play Melancholy Baby One More Time"
commercial situation? Is your work limited to recordings? Do any of
you play microtonal guitars with 31 frets or whatever arrangement in
smoky clubs and bars?

And yes, I've checked out Charles Lucy's fret diagrams and considered
the possibilities. I don't play electric, I play nylon strings, and
yes, this looks like an interesting plaything, to get one of my
second string guitars refretted... I don't think my own lutherie
skills are up to any level I would want to play on, and I don't want
to take my practice time doing carpentry / luthiery, but obviously I
can get the job done by a real luthier, and I know a few... It may be
time to go ahead and dive into this! I'm pretty sure that I have run
across other systems besides Mr. Lucy's - any comments on pros and
cons from the rest of you? Any of you play on scalloped fretboards?

Thanks - jack

Hi Jack!

Thanks for saying hello. There must be some critical mass
of microtonalists required before forming bands becomes
likely, and we're not there yet. That said, Jon Catler's
current project is called Willie McBlind,

http://cdbaby.com/cd/williemcblind

It's all high-limit JI. A bit corny, but fun. His prior
project, Birdhouse, was interesting too. His project
prior to that, called The Catler Bros, was AMAZING.

http://www.microtones.com/info_crash.htm

Neil Haverstick (out of Denver) is a guitarist who also
works in the band idiom. I highly recommend his album
Acoustic Stick.

Other than that, there are microtonal scenes in the major
cities:
* Chicago (Aaron Johnson's band Divide by Pi and the
Untwelve organization)
* Boston (see my recent message to Caleb)
* New York (Johnny Reinhard's AFMM and various others)
* L.A. (people revolving around Erv Wilson and Kraig
Grady... unfortunately for L.A.ers, Kraig recently moved
to Australia)
* San Diego (the Sonic Arts ensemble and various others)

But many of us work in isolation or collaborate through
the internet. See the sister group

/makemicromusic/

which is all about sharing microtonal music.

-Carl

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Jack" <gvr.jack@...> wrote:
>
> Hello Microtonal Heads,
> I've been lurking on your list for a mere couple of weeks,
scratching
> my head over the usual suspects: 5 figure ratios, special list
jargon
> and so on. However, I have a big thanks to offer to y'all for
> pointing me to the ideas of Harry Partch, and the tidbit of
> information that his ideas inform a lot of microtonal activity. I
> didn't get, before, that microtonal experiments with all the arcane
> math that you guys swap like marbles might be related to making
> better use of the high harmonics beyond 12-et's possibilities. This
> possibility has been bugging me for years on a merely personal
> daydream level.
>
> (There's a great violinist in my town, a classical player turned to
> improvisation, and I hear him doing cool things with his upper
> harmonics quite frequently, and although I don't know how he
> conceives what he's doing, the sound is for real.) Yours truly is a
> very commercial musician making a living playing a conventionally
> tuned guitar, and beyond bending a string here and there, I'm
pretty
> locked into a 12-et theoretical world (even though as must be
fairly
> obvious, a guitar has its own peculiar temper).
>
> So are there any of you who actually put your microtonal skills to
> work in any kind of working band "Play Melancholy Baby One More
Time"
> commercial situation? Is your work limited to recordings? Do any of
> you play microtonal guitars with 31 frets or whatever arrangement
in
> smoky clubs and bars?
>
> And yes, I've checked out Charles Lucy's fret diagrams and
considered
> the possibilities. I don't play electric, I play nylon strings, and
> yes, this looks like an interesting plaything, to get one of my
> second string guitars refretted... I don't think my own lutherie
> skills are up to any level I would want to play on, and I don't
want
> to take my practice time doing carpentry / luthiery, but obviously
I
> can get the job done by a real luthier, and I know a few... It may
be
> time to go ahead and dive into this! I'm pretty sure that I have
run
> across other systems besides Mr. Lucy's - any comments on pros and
> cons from the rest of you? Any of you play on scalloped fretboards?
>
> Thanks - jack
>
From Robert. More info on microtonality can be had if you insert
MicroMadeEasy into the Search for other groups Box. All the messages
are open to the general public and many people visit without
joining which is fine with me considering that I do most of the
posting and I delete chit-chat after conversations play out.

2008/11/1 Jack <gvr.jack@...>:
> Hello Microtonal Heads,

<snip>
> information that his ideas inform a lot of microtonal activity. I
> didn't get, before, that microtonal experiments with all the arcane
> math that you guys swap like marbles might be related to making
> better use of the high harmonics beyond 12-et's possibilities. This
> possibility has been bugging me for years on a merely personal
> daydream level.

<snip>
> So are there any of you who actually put your microtonal skills to
> work in any kind of working band "Play Melancholy Baby One More Time"
> commercial situation? Is your work limited to recordings? Do any of
> you play microtonal guitars with 31 frets or whatever arrangement in
> smoky clubs and bars?
<snip>
> And yes, I've checked out Charles Lucy's fret diagrams and considered
> the possibilities. I don't play electric, I play nylon strings, and
> yes, this looks like an interesting plaything, to get one of my
> second string guitars refretted... I don't think my own lutherie
> skills are up to any level I would want to play on, and I don't want
> to take my practice time doing carpentry / luthiery, but obviously I
> can get the job done by a real luthier, and I know a few... It may be
> time to go ahead and dive into this! I'm pretty sure that I have run
> across other systems besides Mr. Lucy's - any comments on pros and
> cons from the rest of you? Any of you play on scalloped fretboards?

LucyTuning is fine. You imply cover bands above. To get standards
right the obvious thing is to go for a meantone. LucyTuning is such.
19 frets per octave (fpo) will work for all the common keys.
(Actually 17 fpo is enough but you may as well round up to get a more
equal fretting.) The chords will sound purer than 12-equal. Because
it's a meantone you won't have to worry about comma shifts. Rock/pop
doesn't tend to require a closed cycle of fifths. It has the virtue
that the 19 frets are relatively equally spaced so there are fewer
horror chords out of those playable. But there are also fewer feather
beds. You can go for more frets in such a way that they may be
difficult to play, but in the worst case you can safely ignore them.

You talk about high harmonics above. LucyTuning isn't so good for
this. 7 chords come out two different ways. One is the logical
extended 5-limit tuning. The other approximates the harmonic series
chunk 4:5:6:7. Sometimes you have a choice of which to play. The
7-limit version is closer than in 12-equal, but still a long way out,
and you can improve this with a different fretting.

I chose something closer to quarter-comma meantone for my guitar (a
strat copy). The 5-limit chords are theoretically purer although I
don't think that matters. The 7-limit seventh chords are much closer
to just and that does make them smoother. There are also some tenuous
11-limit chords that exist.

It is harder to play than regular fretting for some chords. For
example, an A requires you to shove three fingers between narrowly
spaced frets on consecutive strings. I got it working but it's more
restrictive. It should be less of a problem with LucyTuning or a
classical guitar, where I believe the neck is wider near the nut.

I think 12 fpo would actually be fine for playing in G. It'd make the
A (as V/V) easier. But it also means you can't go far outside G. Not
only are some notes not there but you can't even bend up to them. As
there's plenty of stuff to play in G this is a viable option but it
does restrict your repertoire.

One thing I've thought about for converting experienced guitarists is
a fretting around 1/6-comma meantone. Maybe 17fpo, or 12fpo with the
first fret doubled. It wouldn't be much harder to play than standard
and the simple chords would still be tuned better. Because the fifths
are better a lot of guitar logic would make more sense. And because
it's closer to 12-equal there wouldn't be such a problem playing with
traditionally tuned instruments. But the narrowly spaced frets are
narrower so perhaps that'd be a problem.

To other ideas -- these tend to be either equal temperaments or JI.
I've never been convinced by the logic for an equal temperament. You
can play in all keys but guitarists tend to stick to the easy ones
anyway. You still can't use a capo because with the frets closer
together the tension gets to high if you bend the string right to the
fretboard. (At least, I couldn't get this to work.) Still, some
people like their equal temperaments.

As for JI, there are people who do it, but it restricts the
repertoire. You maybe happy with comma shifts but sometimes you have
to do without an open string because it's a comma out from what you
want. That said, I have a book of songs that only use G, C, D, and
Em. I think they'd work fine in JI. It depends on whether you want a
microtonal fretting to only play 4 chords ;-)

I'm looking at a fretting using magic temperament. I think it would
work but, like JI, not with standards. It doesn't even look right
with a variant of the standard open string tuning. As I haven't
implemented it I can't say how it sounds. If you're interested I can
give more details. As I assume you won't be interested I'll save the
trouble.

Graham

I wrote:

> It is harder to play than regular fretting for some chords. For
> example, an A requires you to shove three fingers between narrowly
> spaced frets on consecutive strings. I got it working but it's more
> restrictive. It should be less of a problem with LucyTuning or a
> classical guitar, where I believe the neck is wider near the nut.

I remembered that wrong. A is on the wider spaced frets, but with
near quarter-comma meantone they still end up too close to play it
comfortably. So one solution is something more like 1/6-comma
meantone. That's another reason I think a fretting based on 1/5- or
1/6-comma meantone would really make sense provided you don't want
7-limit chords. It'd be easier to play for most practical chords than
1/4-comma while being purer than 12-equal and not so far away to
frighten the horses.

Graham

Graham, thank you very much for your detailed answer. I apologize
that I can only give a grateful, rather than informed, response. I am
going to keep reading the list, questioning my assumptions, and
absorbing the details (and learning the jargon!). It hadn't really
dawned on me, for instance, that I might really question whether a
closed circle of fifths is necessary. Anyway, thank you very much,
lots of food for thought.

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "Graham Breed" <gbreed@...> wrote:
>
> 2008/11/1 Jack <gvr.jack@...>:
> > Hello Microtonal Heads,
....
> > So are there any of you who actually put your microtonal skills to
> > work in any kind of working band "Play Melancholy Baby One More
> > Time" commercial situation? ... Do any of you play microtonal
> > guitars with 31 frets or whatever arrangement in smoky clubs and
> > bars?
> <snip>
> > And yes, I've checked out Charles Lucy's fret diagrams and
considered
> > the possibilities...
---
> LucyTuning is fine. You imply cover bands above. To get standards
> right the obvious thing is to go for a meantone. LucyTuning is such.
> 19 frets per octave (fpo) will work for all the common keys.
> (Actually 17 fpo is enough ...) The chords will sound purer than 12-
> equal. Because it's a meantone you won't have to worry about comma
> shifts. Rock/pop doesn't tend to require a closed cycle of
> fifths. It has the virtue that the 19 frets are relatively equally
> spaced so there are fewer horror chords out of those playable.
...
> You talk about high harmonics above. LucyTuning isn't so good for
> this. ... you can improve this with a different fretting.
>
> I chose something closer to quarter-comma meantone for my guitar (a
> strat copy). The 5-limit chords are theoretically purer although I
> don't think that matters. The 7-limit seventh chords are much
> closer to just and that does make them smoother. There are also
> some tenuous 11-limit chords that exist.
...
> I think 12 fpo would actually be fine for playing in G. It'd make
> the A (as V/V) easier. But it also means you can't go far outside
> G. Not only are some notes not there but you can't even bend up to
> them. As there's plenty of stuff to play in G this is a viable
> option but it does restrict your repertoire.
>
> One thing I've thought about for converting experienced guitarists
> is a fretting around 1/6-comma meantone. Maybe 17fpo, or 12fpo
> with the > first fret doubled. It wouldn't be much harder to play
> than standard and the simple chords would still be tuned better.
> Because the fifths are better a lot of guitar logic would make more
> sense. And because it's closer to 12-equal there wouldn't be such
> a problem playing with traditionally tuned instruments. But the
> narrowly spaced frets are narrower so perhaps that'd be a problem.
> ...
> I've never been convinced by the logic for an equal temperament.
> You can play in all keys but guitarists tend to stick to the easy
> ones anyway. You still can't use a capo because with the frets
> closer together the tension gets to high if you bend the string
> right to the fretboard...
>
> As for JI, there are people who do it, but it restricts the
> repertoire. You maybe happy with comma shifts but sometimes you
> have to do without an open string because it's a comma out from
> what you want. That said, I have a book of songs that only use G,
> C, D, and Em. I think they'd work fine in JI. It depends on
> whether you want a microtonal fretting to only play 4 chords ;-)
>
> I'm looking at a fretting using magic temperament. I think it would
> work but, like JI, not with standards. It doesn't even look right
> with a variant of the standard open string tuning. As I haven't
> implemented it I can't say how it sounds. If you're interested I
> can give more details. As I assume you won't be interested I'll
> save the trouble.
> Graham