the harmonic series, tonality, equal temperament, math, etc

[xochitl]

ive been trying to find out here and there about all this but seem to get a different perspective depending on who's writing.

basically, from the universe's point of view, what scale/system conforms better to the laws of nature?

let's say you're god [yea i know, just pretend], how would you write music?  i doubt it will be atonal 

[Scarpia]

The human auditory system perceives two notes to be more harmonious (consonant rather than dissonant) when their frequencies are related by simple ratios.  The perfect octave is a 2:1 ratio, the perfect fifth 3:2, the perfect forth 4:3, etc.   That is related to the physics and mathematics of oscillating objects, and the physiology of the human ear. 

Beyond that, music is determined by human psychology and culture.  Western classical music is one way to organize consonance and dissonance, but there are others.  I don't see any basis for deciding that one or another is superior.  Of course, there is the human tendency to label what someone else prefers as "against nature."

[Opus106]

I'll let you know after I finish reading this. 

[asin]0199754276[/asin]

[Superhorn]

   I think  some of us here have heard the fascinatingly weird  music of  the Californian  composer  Harry Partch , who invented his own 
strange-looking instruments capable of dividing the scale in no fewer than 43 ! pitches !
Partch was a an arrogant, snobbish SOB who contemptuously dismiised the whole vast tradition of  Western Classical Music
merely because it uses only 12 tones .  Pretty presumptuous of him , eh ?  Of course, he had every right to  write microtnal music
using specially created instruments,  but  what right did he have to insist that HIS music was valid  and  western classical music was not ?

[xochitl]

partch is the reason i started investigating this issue

for the longest time [especially taking music theory in school] i wondered more about the why of the actual tones than the '12 notes' and their harmonic implications.  the major third and fifth always bothered me and i didnt know why they sounded so so wrong if they were supposed to be super consonant and the building blocks etc.  i actually re-tuned an old piano in school to perceived consonance only to find out too late that id 'screwed up' everything but c major.  and dont even get me started on how certain keys are supposed sound different...not on equal temperament they dont!

maybe negating the system was going too far [and i'm taking your word for it that he did; i havent read his books in their entirety], but at least he had the temerity to question it and come to his own conclusion based on certain facts rather than just take accepted practice as law.

of course he wasnt the only one, and others came to different conclusions

[Cato]

basically, from the universe's point of view, what scale/system conforms better to the laws of nature?

Since the Universe contains everything in Nature, then the Universe contains all systems and all laws.

Which "laws of nature" are you talking about?  Mathematical, psychological, biological?

Harry Partch made a very good case for his system of 43-tones in Genesis of a Music.  It follows laws on tuning dealing with the 11th-limit.

Others have made a good case for 19-tone tune tuning, 31-tone, etc. and they all have mathematical reasons for this.

the major third and fifth always bothered me and i didnt know why they sounded so so wrong

I suspect you have extremely sensitive ears (welcome to the club!) and this is why you have been attracted to microtonality and such questions.   Keep in mind that most people do not have such issues and to them, anything outside the usual 12-notes will sound out-of-tune, or weird, or whatever.

Most people can hear differences down to a 12th of tone, i.e. 144 notes per octave  .  They could, therefore, all be used: but should they be used?

The problem is not with conforming to "laws of nature" but with expression and psychological perception.  Does a chord or melody using e.g. C - E1/3 - G3/4 create a sound which will elicit a response from a person other than a wrinkling of the nose that it is "out of tune" ?

If so, if it evokes something, no matter inchoate, then it could be fair game.

Listen to the microtonal works of Easley Blackwood and Ivan Wyschnegradsky, especially the latter: you will find them on YouTube.  Consider what they are creating, and how the average person may react: you may find all kinds of wonderful things in them, with your sensitive ears.

The audience may not, and the tiny minority interested in such things will probably not convince the majority any time soon!

let's say you're God [yea i know, just pretend], how would you write music? i doubt it will be atonal 

Why would God not write "atonal" music?   0:)   Have you heard Arnold Schoenberg's Jakobsleiter or Moses und Aron ?

In any case, God would use the Music of the Spheres!   0:)  In F# minor!   

[snyprrr]

I have slightly soured on the whole Topic. For whatever reason, everytime I hear something attached to the word 'microtonal' it's usually the aural equivalent of ennui.

Keep in mind that a 'blues' bend on a guitar is 'microtonal', so, all is not lost.


My main example here is Ezra Sims, on a CRI cd, and his stuff is...mm... slightly dreary and static... I can hear once in a while, but only IN RELATION to everything else. I fear I would become a Partchian SOB if I HAD to listen to this stuff only!

[Karl Henning]

Why would God not write "atonal" music?   0:)

My favorite question this week!

[Karl Henning]

I'll let you know after I finish reading this. 

[asin]0199754276[/asin]

How's it going, Nav?

[Karl Henning]

Hm, I sure am enjoying the "prelude," which includes this insight:

Here is the surprising thing: music does not have to be enjoyed. That sounds terrible, but it is a fact . . . .

[Cato]

I have slightly soured on the whole Topic. For whatever reason, every time I hear something attached to the word 'microtonal' it's usually the aural equivalent of ennui.

My main example here is Ezra Sims, on a CRI cd, and his stuff is...mm... slightly dreary and static... I can hear once in a while, but only IN RELATION to everything else. I fear I would become a Partchian SOB if I HAD to listen to this stuff only!

Well, the fault then is in the composer, rather than the nature of the scales!  I am not sure a scale ipso facto produces ennui!   

Try the Easley Blackwood works on his CD with works using scales of between 13 and 24 tones. 

[asin]B000009KIL[/asin]

Or the Ivan Wyschnegradsky 24 Preludes

[asin]B000063X10[/asin]

YouTube can be a source for Wyschnegradsky's works especially.

I do not believe these CD's would cause temporary or permanent ennui, but...

[Karl Henning]

Well, the fault then is in the composer, rather than the nature of the scales!  I am not sure a scale ipso facto produces ennui!   

Pace Plato ; )

[some guy]

Interesting you should have mentioned that, Karl.

I recently had a conversation with a friend of mine in Ireland who is a composer and who teaches composition about this very thing. Her very forcefully put take on it was that the point of making music, making new music, is not about enjoyment at all.

And my recent reading in Herbert Brün has supplied a logic for that: enjoyment implies familiarity. Comfort. Understanding.

New (if it's going to mean something other than merely recent) implies unfamiliarity. Discomfort. Bewilderment. Not that you do things in order to bewilder, which is a charge often leveled. But that if you've got something going that no one's ever thought of or experienced before, then it will bewilder, at first. Just simple logic.

Brün's notion of composing is that you are writing the things that you do not yet like.

OK. So far so good. (Or bad, depending....)

To anticipate the inevitable, what I would say about that is that enjoyment is quite often a side-effect of listening to music. It is perhaps, eventually, an inevitable side-effect. And a pleasant and enjoyable side-effect. Enjoyable enjoyment. Has a nice ring to it, eh? But it's not the goal. And it's not necessary.

Kind of like that "emotional connection" thing that comes up so often in conversations about music, particularly in the ones about listening to new music (new or new to the listener, either one)--that if there's no emotional connection, there's no point. Which has always puzzled me. As a human, I make emotional responses to just about everything. There's always an emotional connection of some kind or other. It just happens quite naturally. I don't understand a situation in which there is no emotional connection at all. (I do, however, understand that people who talk about "emotional connection" are using a very narrow band of the whole emotional perspective. )

[Edit: Nice* to see the "fault" thing coming up and pointing right at the composer. Usually people are whinging about the audience always being blamed. Nope. Not always. Nice blatant blaming of the composer. And wrong, of course. Not that "fault" is really the issue. But all one would have to do to test the blame game is find someone who does not find Ezra Sims to be dreary or static. Or at the very least, who does not find static to be a dreary thing. Shouldn't be too hard to do.

And we DO already know that snyprrr, for one, has serious problems with static-ness.]

*Schadenfreude

[Opus106]

How's it going, Nav?

Dropped it in the middle of the second chapter (which is essentially music theory 101). Nothing wrong with the book per se, it's just that sometimes I wish for an understanding beyond mere definitions and right now I simply cannot concentrate enough to study further. And I'm more in the mood for literature/fiction at the mo.

[Karl Henning]

Dropped it in the middle of the second chapter (which is essentially music theory 101). Nothing wrong with the book per se, it's just that sometimes I wish for an understanding beyond mere definitions and right now I simply cannot concentrate enough to study further. And I'm more in the mood for literature/fiction at the mo.

Understand your being more in the mood for something else, entirely. If when you return to it I may be of any help to you, do not hesitate &c. &c. : )

Interesting you should have mentioned that, Karl.

I recently had a conversation with a friend of mine in Ireland who is a composer and who teaches composition about this very thing. Her very forcefully put take on it was that the point of making music, making new music, is not about enjoyment at all.

And my recent reading in Herbert Brün has supplied a logic for that: enjoyment implies familiarity. Comfort. Understanding.

New (if it's going to mean something other than merely recent) implies unfamiliarity. Discomfort. Bewilderment. Not that you do things in order to bewilder, which is a charge often leveled. But that if you've got something going that no one's ever thought of or experienced before, then it will bewilder, at first. Just simple logic.

Brün's notion of composing is that you are writing the things that you do not yet like.

OK. So far so good. (Or bad, depending....)

To anticipate the inevitable, what I would say about that is that enjoyment is quite often a side-effect of listening to music. It is perhaps, eventually, an inevitable side-effect. And a pleasant and enjoyable side-effect. Enjoyable enjoyment. Has a nice ring to it, eh? But it's not the goal. And it's not necessary [....]

Aye, which is one reason (one of many, I suppose) why I object to the oversimplification that all music, all art, is essentially an entertainment (not that entertainment is a bad thing . . . .)

[Opus106]

Understand your being more in the mood for something else, entirely. If when you return to it I may be of any help to you, do not hesitate &c. &c. : )

Thanks. I appreciate the offer.

[jochanaan]

When I learned how to tune pianos, I also learned that human ears do not seem to desire mathematical perfection.  Of course, our system of equal temperament came about because you can only tune to one key perfectly; but there is also the phenomenon of "stretched" octaves: the lower notes of an octave are tuned just slightly flat, while the higher notes are a little sharp--very little, too small to hear audible "beats," but enough so our ears think they're on pitch.  If a piano (or other instrument) is tuned mathematically exactly, our ears tend to hear the lower notes as sharp and the upper notes as flat.  It would seem that, at least on this side of Heaven, there is no such thing as perfect intonation.

[Chaszz]

The topic of harmony here has been confined mainly to microtonality and tuning, when IMH(?)O the fascination with harmony is what the great Joh. Seb. was demostrating in the Well Tempered Clavier: that by tempering the tones you could make sequences of notes and chords from distant keys make proximate sense in the tonic key. Thus potentially all chords and chord progressions in whatever key become at-home in the tonic key. As people say about freedom, this concept still seems revolutionary though it's over two centuries old. After Wagner, following this concept, broke harmony down chromatically and extended it laterally in all directions in Tristan, so that there was not even a home key anymore, the floodgates were open. But the phase he initiated, polytonality, where there were still fervent realtionships amoing the keys, was but a brief interlude as composers rushed through it, to get to atonality, which would be the grand destination. But for many listeners, a barren destination it has been. Has the concept which Bach and Wagner put forth really been exhausted, or only dropped by the wayside prematurely as not being intellectually worthy of being the purported grand destination? And do we live by the intellect or the emotions? (Not you, Duchamp!) 

[Cato]

Characteristic French musical experience a la Debussy, Ravel, Messiaen, Dutilleux & Boulez (vertically oriented) contrasting the Germanic .. Schoenberg, Berg, Stockhausen (relatively horizontal), with overlap of course. The chromatic harmonies in Messiaen which are perceived differently from chromatic harmonies in Schoenberg .. the former being static and colouristic, the latter, dynamic and suggesting imminent resolution.

These ideas are parallel with the classic theory of pictorial art: color is associated with the emotional response to a painting, while the lines emphasize the intellectual aspects.

Most art has both of course, so it would be a matter of the balance between the two.

[Karl Henning]

Seems to me that one can respond emotionally to line.