source file: m1582.txt Date: Sat, 14 Nov 1998 11:18:43 -0800 Subject: Re: Paul Erlich From: Kraig Grady Yes Paul would be interested! The question of Native American tuning is something I have been looking into for quite a while having a potent amount of Chipewa blood. For years I have been collecting transcriptions (mainly Francis Densmore) as well as listening to the recordings at the southwest museum which is about 3 miles from where I am. There they have tape from the edison cylinders. Still by the time these recordings were done, she was only able to get solo recordings where as much of this music was sung in groups. This music is gone for the most part or greatly corrupted by 12et. Here though are some of my observations: for the most part the vocal style (high vibrato) bend so much that a definite pitch is impossible to determine scientifically. To the ear when I "have" to play them on a fixed pitched instrument I have found they "work" better over harmonic and subharmonic sequences or related pentatonics. 7s make more sense than not and 11 are common in more places than one. That various tribes have subharmonic flutes is well known. There is oral tradition that says that it was common with some tribes to have the women hold high drones on which the male voices would start in unison and descend downward. A subharmonic scale supplies good intervals. In the southwest you have quite a few varied tribes. the Yaqui have always been one of my favorites (my father played my 78s of them). I believe that Partch heard this tribe growing up. Their music represents some of the most remote from western music found in the U.S. -- Kraig Grady North American Embassy of Anaphoria Island http://www.anaphoria.com