source file: m1603.txt Date: Sat, 05 Dec 1998 21:58:11 +1100 Subject: Bram's diamond From: Greg Schiemer Bram's diamond just caught my interest. I recently had a premiere of an a capella work called Vedic Mass written for two sopranos and two mezzo-sopranos. The work is based on this very same 7-limit diamond which I've notated in standard notation. For rehearsals leading up to the premiere, the singers - a Sydney-based group called Voiceworks - trained using a Csound crib in 12-tet. It was my hope that with the harmonic bias of the dominant 7ths & half dimished chords, the vocalists' intonation would gravitate in an a capella situation towards 7-limit JI. However even though most aspects of their performance went off beautifully, I found, given the degree of vibrato, it was hard to tell whether vocalists actually sang in 7-limit JI. When the piece is done again in easter next year the same singers will be directed by a more experienced musical director who wants to train the singers using a Csound crib in 7-limit JI. Some singers, like Jane Manning, argue that vibrato is their way of dealing with fatigue. Is it too silly to expect that such a work will be realised in 7-limit JI by operatically trained singers given their irresistible inclination for vibrato ?