source file: mills3.txt Date: Thu, 25 Dec 1997 14:29:03 +0100 Subject: Re: More on Just Intonation 2 From: gbreed@cix.compulink.co.uk (Graham Breed) Gregg Gibson wrote: > To pretend that a singer can > accurately produce an interval four or five perfect fifths above the > tonic is nonsense; this is a commatic disjunct dissonance, and not > accurately singable. There's an assumtion Gregg makes here that goes to the heart of his argument, and I hope I won't be accused of carping by pointing it out. It is that temperament has something to do with singing. Certainly, singers temper intervals. However, they do not require an explicit system to do so. Actually, four fifths octave reduce to two major tones. I wouldn't be at all surprised if it were possible to sing them both accurately. 9/8 functions as a melodic consonance, but this is lost in 19 equal. However, this is not worth arguing about. More to the point, I would not expect the average singer to produce accurate intervals from an equal temperament. It is not unreasonable, however, to expect a guitarist to tune her five strings to five just fifths. A temperament that takes this into account does have advantages. Now, to get to the heart of the matter. What difference does it make to a singer if I play a chord sequence on my keyboard in schismic temperament, comma shifts and all? I wouldn't expect any variable pitch instrument to follow instructions to more precision than 12 pitch classes. If the harmony makes sense, it shouldn't be too difficult to sing in tune with it. As the commas are well below the melodic limen, they shouldn't cause any confusion. > These matters are widely known ? they are also widely ignored or denied > or imperfectly known. The ignorant very typically imagine that We Clever > Moderns have invented a new music in which all the Stupid Old Ideas of > the dead past don't matter. Firstly, Gregg, there's a character there that comes out as a filled in rectangle on my screen. Can you try keeping to strict ASCII? Secondly, I consider myself to be post-modern. Thirdly, the important point. No musician before the 1950s had a digital computer. Theorists before this date, therefore, did not need to consider the tuning of an instrument that can produce a very large number of notes to a high degree of precision, but that nevertheless requires each pitch to be specified numerically. You can bet singers in the 16th century produced an enormous variety of intervals, but there was neither a reason to write them all down, nor the ability to do so. Despite all this, schismic temperament is at least implicit in medieval Islamic theory, which is where I got the idea from. So, there's nothing new there. It is in no way arrogant to say that I have an instrument of hitherto undreamt of resources. I intend to use those resources to the utmost of my abilities, in order to make up for it's deficiencies relative to an acoustic instrument. Part of that means explicitly specifying intervals of less than 50 cents. Also, using septimal harmony. The advantages of using meantone (or mesotonic -- a better word, but I'm not used to it) need not be stated, as anyone who subscribes to this mailing list must be aware of them. I expect most people will tune fixed pitch instruments to such a temperament, if they wish to play harmonic music, and they will be missing very little. That doesn't stop me using any tuning I feel like using. I can't be held responsible for a whole culture. SMTPOriginator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu From: Aline Surman Subject: misc PostedDate: 25-12-97 17:37:14 SendTo: CN=coul1358/OU=AT/O=EZH ReplyTo: tuning@eartha.mills.edu $MessageStorage: 0 $UpdatedBy: CN=notesrv2/OU=Server/O=EZH,CN=coul1358/OU=AT/O=EZH,CN=Manuel op de Coul/OU=AT/O=EZH RouteServers: CN=notesrv2/OU=Server/O=EZH,CN=notesrv1/OU=Server/O=EZH RouteTimes: 25-12-97 17:34:59-25-12-97 17:34:59,25-12-97 17:34:28-25-12-97 17:34:28 DeliveredDate: 25-12-97 17:34:29 Categories: $Revisions: Received: from ns.ezh.nl ([137.174.112.59]) by notesrv2.ezh.nl (Lotus SMTP MTA SMTP v4.6 (462.2 9-3-1997)) with SMTP id C1256578.005B15EE; Thu, 25 Dec 1997 17:36:50 +0100 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA25559; Thu, 25 Dec 1997 17:37:14 +0100 Date: Thu, 25 Dec 1997 17:37:14 +0100 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA25564 Received: (qmail 22219 invoked from network); 25 Dec 1997 08:37:11 -0800 Received: from localhost (HELO ella.mills.edu) (127.0.0.1) by localhost with SMTP; 25 Dec 1997 08:37:11 -0800 Message-Id: <34A29460.4E79@dnvr.uswest.net> Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@eartha.mills.edu