Re: What'd I miss??? - the I-IV-V7-I cadence in different tunings

> [Jerry Eskelin, TD 533.20]
> Monz, I had decided to pass on responding to your rude post
> and dumped that Digest without answering it, but this morning
> thought the better of it.

> [Jerry Eskelin, TD 535.12]
>
> ???
>
> [Paul Erlich, TD 533.14]
>> I hope Gerald Eskelin, Mark Nowitzky, and others will listen
>> to these files and share their honest impressions. Thanks
>> again, Monz!!!
>>
> [Jerry]
> I must have skimmed by this. Sorry, Monz. What Digest would
> it have been on.
> I'll go back and get it.

Jerry: I was going to say 'probably the one you deleted'. :)

But it's not. The reference is to my post in TD 533.11
- the same Digest that had both Paul's comment and your
response to my 'rude' post.

I'll save you the trouble, because the same info is on a
webpage at:
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/td/monzo/i-iv-v7-i/i-iv-v-i.htm

It illustrates the I-IV-V7-I progression outlined by Dave
Keenan in a recent post [TD 529.21], using a variety of
tunings including the 7-limit one you like, the 5-limit
one I illustrated last week, an adaptive pseudo-7-limit one
proposed by Dave, and others, and has a MIDI-file for each
example - with, I should add, a nice bland vibrato-less
harmonium patch (General MIDI 'reed organ').

I intentionally uploaded this experiment without giving my
own reactions to the different tunings, so that others would
listen to it unencumbered by my own personal bias.

Since Paul [TD 533.14] and Carl [TD 535.5] have given their
reactions, I suppose now I can state mine. Briefly.
I agree completely with both of them.

My favorite for sheer beauty of sound is Dave's adaptive-JI
tuning. It has all the sensuousness of the 7-limit version
with none of the 'nausea' experienced by Paul. Sure sounds
close to barbershop to me.

The 5-limit version with the 9:16 '7th' gives a nice
dissonance on the V7, and sounds like it would work great
for a lot of 'classical' music.

The one with 5:9 sounds terrible; I suppose there are
contexts where it would work, but probably nowhere near
as many as would befit the tuning above; most likely,
it would sound a lot better following a chord which does
*not* contain a 4/3, but rather, a 3/2 or some flattened
'5th' (in relation to the tonic) descending to the 27/20.
I suggest that Dave Keenan stop considering this tuning the
'standard' 5-limit 'dominant 7th' chord.
(and I'm going to miss you too, Dave)

The meantone version to me sounds much more bland than
any of the JI versions, altho I would argue strongly in
favor of it for performance of Baroque keyboard music
simply out of historical appropriateness.

The 12-EDO version sounds more bland than that. But the
V7 *is* a lot smoother than any of the non-7-limit JI versions.

The Pythagorean V7 sounds horrible to my ears. The fact
that it's really out of context here, in the midst of a
bunch of 5-limit triads, doesn't help it any.

The V7 with the 64:81 and 4:7, on the other hand, sounds
quite good to me, probably because of the gravitiational
effect, noted in my text, being exerted by the sharpness
of the '3rd' and the flatness of the '7th'. To my ears,
it makes a strong resolution onto the I.

And my major dissenting opinion: I really *like* the regular
7-limit version. The sliding around of the pitches doesn't
bother me at all. I suppose this is because of the direction
my own composing has taken over the past few years, exploring
all kinds of alternate tunings for familiar chords.

Post some more adaptive-JI schemes that distribute the 63:64
differently and I'll add them to the collection.

-monz

Joseph L. Monzo Philadelphia monz@juno.com
http://www.ixpres.com/interval/monzo/homepage.html
|"...I had broken thru the lattice barrier..."|
| - Erv Wilson |
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