source file: mills2.txt Date: Tue, 10 Jun 1997 08:32:09 +0200 Subject: where do the 5ths go? From: Aline Surman Here's something I've been thinking about lately...it's known that the spiral of 5ths has been explored pretty well over the last few thousand years, and by mathematically "bringing down" cycles of 5ths, we obtain patterns of notes for an octave...no problem. But, there's something wrong with that. Those 5ths that we mathematically alter...we are not HEARING them in their proper place in the Universe. They are actually sounding at some frequency well beyond our hearing. So, just where are they, then? They must be doing something, somewhere...they do exist, and are a part of the original fundamental sound that created them. Scales built from these spirals are artificial, in a sense. Understanding this endless spiral of harmonics is one thing on paper, another in the world of Sound. If a "frequency" is out of the hearing of human ears, is it perhaps affecting other parts of the being instead? Can sound (and we know it can) have physiological effects that are involuntary? How about spiritual effects? What if we heard a scale in the actual pitch range of all the notes, instead of them being altered, moved around, sort of? Are there beings somewhere who can hear a wider range than we do? We know dogs, and I'm sure other animals as well, hear sounds we do not...we also know stars, planets, etc, are all sending out zillions of frequencies, well beyond our seeing or hearing. How, I sometimes wonder, can we draw all of these different concepts together and absorb them into a kind of music that could heal planets? On a related note, Ben Johnson's comments about our society and harmful music are well taken...of course, it's a big subject, and can make one think of related topics. There are numerous societies with "out of tune" musical systems, such as gamelan music...what's going on there, because they seem rather peaceful as cultures, in general. Obviously, the INTENT of the music is crucial...if you had just intonation music that promoted satanism, I don't suppose that would do anyone any good, either. And, what about the feeling that the performer/composer attempts to communicate with this music in unnatural tunings? Does that help balance the out of tuneness of the system? But, we are a screwed up bunch, in a lot of ways, and I don't think the pop/rock scene is helping much at all. And, the inharmonious vibrations of all that loud, out of tune music: I can see how that phenomenon could be harmful to people. I sure don't let my kid watch much TV, for the same reason. There is much low level nonsense in our world today. As far as music and drugs, yes, there's always been a lot of pot/alcohol/cocaine/heroin use in music...but, I just read a couple of articles about Prozac and Ridilyn, and an awful lot of non musicians are using these as well, including our poor little kids, who are being drugged at school to help calm them down and make them pay attention and be better students...scary stuff, a nightmare to me. Our whole culture is drug ridden, not to mention all the antibiotics we get in our system from cows milk. I truly believe that music is one of the most powerful forces in the world...sounds like Johnson does, too. That's why the math is fun and all, but the sound is the real deal...and it sure does affect all beings that it touches...Hstick Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Tue, 10 Jun 1997 09:11 +0200 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA16443; Tue, 10 Jun 1997 09:11:17 +0200 Date: Tue, 10 Jun 1997 09:11:17 +0200 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA16316 Received: (qmail 25770 invoked from network); 10 Jun 1997 07:11:09 -0000 Received: from localhost (HELO ella.mills.edu) (127.0.0.1) by localhost with SMTP; 10 Jun 1997 07:11:09 -0000 Message-Id: <199706100308_MC2-182E-2351@compuserve.com> Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu