source file: mills2.txt Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 12:55:56 -0800 Subject: mod groups & rhythm; math and music; szanto on 57tet From: Daniel Wolf <106232.3266@compuserve.com> Three items: (1) I don't want to become the Tuning Forum's resident apologist for Princetonian serialism (especially as I am a Wesleyan experimentalist), but fairly thorough work on moduli and rhythm has been produced by the Babbitt crowd (Andrew Mead, Josef Straus et al). The discussion about **tempered** rhythms - may in fact be moot for rhythms executed by players (as opposed to machines). The volume on the psychology of music edited by Diana Deutsch some 15 years ago had a fascinating study of performed rhythms (one of the researchers was Paul Zukovsky). It seems that the degree of tolerance for durational ratios is significantly higher than that for pitches. (The performance by the famous conductor ''P.B." was especially tolerant!). Since the Babbitt time-point system is not comparing durations but points of attack within the measure modulus, and that a metre typically introduces both accentuation and unequal real durations for beats of equal notated durations, it is possibly here that a reasonable analog to temperament might be found. (2) The discussion on modular math has illustrated vividly one of those points where the domains of mathematics and music diverge. The operation of inversion is mathematically transparent in a way that is quite foreign to music. Both our pitch perception and time perception are decidedly directional, and this is, to my ears at least, the great failure of the various serial projects in all their variations. (Babbit, at least, realized this and decided that the row (or set or whatever) was not a theme, and that no version of the row had priority over the others, but the perceptual problems remained when one tried to relate the rows (or segments thereof) to one another.) That said, I would be curious to hear if any list member are composing or have composed serially in some tuning besides 12tet (a perfectly reasonable proposition: quick: what are the all combinatorial octochords for 16tet?)... or has the whole serial era really passed? (3) I am sure that I speak for the majority of the list when I say that eagerly look forward to Jonathan Szanto's review of Robert Goulet's 57tet extravaganza. Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Mon, 16 Dec 1996 01:24 +0100 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA05057; Mon, 16 Dec 1996 01:26:41 +0100 Received: from eartha.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA05061 Received: from by eartha.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) for id QAA14774; Sun, 15 Dec 1996 16:26:39 -0800 Date: Sun, 15 Dec 1996 16:26:39 -0800 Message-Id: <199612160025.QAA29079@dnai.com> Errors-To: madole@ella.mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu