source file: mills2.txt Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 10:24:57 -0800 Subject: mod groups & rhythm From: Gary Morrison <71670.2576@compuserve.com> Jim Kukula's thoughts on similarities between rhythmic and frequency proportions strikes me as creative thinking - applying ideas in one aspect of music to another. That's valuable. I suspect though that pitch and rhythm are fundamentally different when it comes to temperament. Tempering pitches is meaningful because our ears hear in a manner that could perhaps be described as simultaneously in linear and logarithmic frequency scales. For example, octaves have meaning both as 4/3s of a perfect fifth's span of linear frequency, and also as (roughly) 12/7s of a perfect fifth's span on a logarithmic frequency. That first formulation relates those two intervals by their JI, whole-number-ratio basis, and the second formulation relates the two by their perceived pitch distance as is useful for weighing them in building a scale. While we'll all agree that fundamental rhythmic structures show very clear proportions on a linear time or note-rate scale, I doubt if there is much intuitive meaning to a logarithmic time or rate scale. Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Sun, 15 Dec 1996 20:11 +0100 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA04681; Sun, 15 Dec 1996 20:13:53 +0100 Received: from eartha.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA04722 Received: from by eartha.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) for id LAA09527; Sun, 15 Dec 1996 11:13:51 -0800 Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 11:13:51 -0800 Message-Id: <3.0.32.19961215111011.0068b0f4@adnc.com> Errors-To: madole@ella.mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu