source file: mills2.txt
Date: Fri, 15 Nov 1996 07:04:04 -0800

Subject: Re: Ben Deckla, T.D. 886

From: Gary Morrison <71670.2576@CompuServe.COM>

>  During the last 25 years I have worked on Dynamic music, and I believe I know
> a little about it.
>  I think Dynamics in Music is not only a concept resulting from the change of
> the key of a score and consequently the frequency of the notes changes a
> little (about one comma from one to the other), but simply the frequency of
> the notes changes due to other reasons, either the choice of the "better"
> option INCLUDED IN THE SAME KEY, or aesthetical reasons. 

   If I'm reading this correctly, and perhaps I'm not, this "dynamic music" is
essentially the same idea what I've heard "wandering tonics" (which I somewhat
apologize for mentioning again, since it is one of my areas of interest for me,
and I don't want to sound like I'm obsessed with the idea to the exclusion of
all else).  This is where the tonic moves very slightly over the course of a
harmonic progression, often as a result of retaining common tones through a
chord change, always letting the added notes in the following chord adjust to
any notes currently playing.  

   An example of this occurs when you do a very simple I IV ii V7 I chord
progression in JI using this approach.  The tonic falls by a comma when you
retain scale degree 4 from the IV to ii as 4:3 above the original tonic, and us
the degree 2 correctly defined as 6:5 below that degree 4 (which bears a 10:9
relationship to the tonic), as the tuning for the fifth of the V7 chord.  The
result is that your harmony seems to tell you that you just did a 360-degree
turn to land where you started, but you mysteriously don't!  

   I may have misread your description, but if this is what you're talking
about, let me propose that "wandering tonics" may be a better choice of
terminology, since "dynamic" is already reserved for volume changes in music.


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Date: Fri, 15 Nov 1996 07:06:58 -0800
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