16-tone scales

luckily eastern 16-tone-scale composers do only plain chant.

but i know the old western scale with just 12 notes is to fail.

what next?

throw away all western instruments, the piano, saxophone and flute. Apply new markings on the viola.

even in 12-tone music all they do is so predictable. jump 13 tones or 11 which is a good idea, but you recognise all those progressions, easy with just 12 tones.

the next debussy comes out of india. He will put harmony, polytonality on the new scale to a new level. all we can do is sit and listen with our eyes open.

after all symphonic orchestras have switched to 16 no-one will be able to play the old outdated western music.

we all want a revolution in music. start one.

Um... what? Is this a joke? 12TET has failed? The general public begs to differ.

Hey, y'know what this reminds me of?

EARTH HAS 4 CORNER

SIMULTANEOUS 4-DAY

TIME CUBE

IN ONLY 24 HOUR ROTATION.

4 Corner TIME, CUBES EARTH.

And just as accurate, too!

( http://timecube.com/ )

Hey, y'know what this reminds me of?

EARTH HAS 4 CORNER

SIMULTANEOUS 4-DAY

TIME CUBE

IN ONLY 24 HOUR ROTATION.

4 Corner TIME, CUBES EARTH.

And just as accurate, too!

( Time Cube )

I KNEW that for some reason, as I was reading it, I knew I had read something just like it before but about something else.

All I can say is that we western EDUCATED STUPID better realize that our FALSE-GOD WORSHIPING idol DR. PHIL culture will IMPLODE as we watch the INDIAN FILM INDUSTRY epic win in simultaneous four-time-universe.

luckily eastern 16-tone-scale composers do only plain chant.

What about the Western composers that use harmony within their 16-tone temperaments? Check out the section of Johnny Reinhard's Cosmic Rays in 16tET. It's all harmony. (Ditto my most recent piece for string quartet, though that's in conjunction with 30tET.)

but i know the old western scale with just 12 notes is to fail.

what next?

throw away all western instruments, the piano, saxophone and flute. Apply new markings on the viola.

even in 12-tone music all they do is so predictable. jump 13 tones or 11 which is a good idea, but you recognise all those progressions, easy with just 12 tones.

These other tunings are easily played on standard instruments (with the exception maybe of fretted instruments and instruments with set tunings, like the piano and harp, though tunings are easily changed, I've done it a fair amount in my work, and there are plenty of pieces for piano in Just intonation, etc.). Basically, it's already being done.

the next debussy comes out of india. He will put harmony, polytonality on the new scale to a new level. all we can do is sit and listen with our eyes open.

Actually, this already happened, around 1915. And it happened to come from Eastern Europeans, a Mexican, and a few Americans. Unless we go back to the Renaissance and say it came from the Italians.

after all symphonic orchestras have switched to 16 no-one will be able to play the old outdated western music.

we all want a revolution in music. start one.

Considering that people are easily able to play in different tuning systems, I'm not going to buy that. And in terms of the "outdated Western music", Mozart, Bach, and Beethoven seemed to survive fine when the tunings they used were thrown out in favor of 12tET.

Also, why are you limiting yourself to 16? I assume you're talking equal temperament (though you've not actually mentioned clear divisions of the octave, or does your scale not repeat at the octave?) in which case 17tET is much better acoustically.

EDIT:

Also, composers have been calling for this (or at least talking about it) for quite some time.

Varese said in 1916, "Our musical alphabet must be enriched."

Stravinsky, when asked if there was "any musical element still susceptible to radical exploitation and development", said, "Yes: pitch. I even risk a prediction that pitch will comprise the main difference between the 'music of the future' and our music"

Ivor Darreg stated that, "Nobody dares tell a painter not to use this or that color. There is no law ordering sculptors to use only marble under the chisel ... I dare to predict that when more tuning systems are available to composers, the contrast of moods will be a most powerful addition to any composer's vocabulary."

And, in 1911, Busoni stated that, "[...]the gradation of the octave is infinite, and let us draw a little nearer to infinitude."

Even Schoenberg, who considered 12tET a temporary compromise, said of microtones: "Probably, whenever the ear and imagination have matured enough for such music, the scale and the instruments will all at once be available."

And also:

"And above all, this scale [twelve-tone equal temperament] is not the last word, the ultimate goal of music, but rather a provisional stopping place. The overtone series, which led the ear to it, still contains many problems that will have to be faced. And if for the time being we still manage to escape those problems, it is due to little else than a compromise between the natural intervals and our inability to use them — that compromise which we call the tempered system, which amounts to an indefinitely extended truce. This reduction of the natural relations to manageable ones cannot permanently impede the evolution of music; and the ear will have to attack the problems, because it is so disposed."

Why is it that every Eftos post...I just can't understand?

Why is it that every Eftos post...I just can't understand?

step into the time cube and everything will become clear.

a) time cube makes sense.

b) Yeah, this concept is way-old news.

What about the Western composers that use harmony within their 16-tone temperaments? Check out the section of Johnny Reinhard's Cosmic Rays in 16tET. It's all harmony. (Ditto my most recent piece for string quartet, though that's in conjunction with 30tET.)

These other tunings are easily played on standard instruments (with the exception maybe of fretted instruments and instruments with set tunings, like the piano and harp, though tunings are easily changed, I've done it a fair amount in my work, and there are plenty of pieces for piano in Just intonation, etc.). Basically, it's already being done.

Actually, this already happened, around 1915. And it happened to come from Eastern Europeans, a Mexican, and a few Americans. Unless we go back to the Renaissance and say it came from the Italians.

Considering that people are easily able to play in different tuning systems, I'm not going to buy that. And in terms of the "outdated Western music", Mozart, Bach, and Beethoven seemed to survive fine when the tunings they used were thrown out in favor of 12tET.

Also, why are you limiting yourself to 16? I assume you're talking equal temperament (though you've not actually mentioned clear divisions of the octave, or does your scale not repeat at the octave?) in which case 17tET is much better acoustically.

EDIT:

Also, composers have been calling for this (or at least talking about it) for quite some time.

Varese said in 1916, "Our musical alphabet must be enriched."

Stravinsky, when asked if there was "any musical element still susceptible to radical exploitation and development", said, "Yes: pitch. I even risk a prediction that pitch will comprise the main difference between the 'music of the future' and our music"

Ivor Darreg stated that, "Nobody dares tell a painter not to use this or that color. There is no law ordering sculptors to use only marble under the chisel ... I dare to predict that when more tuning systems are available to composers, the contrast of moods will be a most powerful addition to any composer's vocabulary."

And, in 1911, Busoni stated that, "[...]the gradation of the octave is infinite, and let us draw a little nearer to infinitude."

Even Schoenberg, who considered 12tET a temporary compromise, said of microtones: "Probably, whenever the ear and imagination have matured enough for such music, the scale and the instruments will all at once be available."

And also:

"And above all, this scale [twelve-tone equal temperament] is not the last word, the ultimate goal of music, but rather a provisional stopping place. The overtone series, which led the ear to it, still contains many problems that will have to be faced. And if for the time being we still manage to escape those problems, it is due to little else than a compromise between the natural intervals and our inability to use them

It's funny the way you took him seriously.

Should I not have?

Realistically, doesn't the western music system have 24 tones because of quarter steps? They're not used much but they're there

Realistically, doesn't the western music system have 24 tones because of quarter steps? They're not used much but they're there

Realistically, the Western music system has been using just about any division of the octave you can think of dating back to the Greeks. In today's day and age, quarter-tones are seen as rather pedestrian by many, seeing as music has been composed in systems that divide the octave up to the very threshold of human ability to perceive pitch change (205tET, etc.).

Should I not have?

but i know the old western scale with just 12 notes is to fail.

throw away all western instrument

Well, I wouldn't have.

Though I won't deny that it can be an interesting discussion.

On the subject, I'm not an expert, but I seem to recall that in non-experimental music (by which I mean ethnic music that supposedly uses quarter tones), quarter tones are usually used as ornament to a "normal" note, within the traditional division of the octave. Not unlike bending a note on a guitar, but you don't talk about quarter tones in rock music, right?

On the subject, I'm not an expert, but I seem to recall that in non-experimental music (by which I mean ethnic music that supposedly uses quarter tones), quarter tones are usually used as ornament to a "normal" note, within the traditional division of the octave. Not unlike bending a note on a guitar, but you don't talk about quarter tones in rock music, right?

Well these things certainly also exist, but that doesn't mean there aren't still a multitude of tunings out there which don't have much in common with the division of the octave in 12 equal steps. And the "microtonality" of these scales has nothing to do with bending notes. Be that arabic maqam, the scales of gamelan music, etc.

Of course, arabic music -does- have a lot in common with our division of the octave in 12 steps in the sense that it is built on what we call quartertones, i.e. 24 steps per octave. But those "quarter tones" are not just variants of a 12-tone scale, they are all individual notes, a selection of which is used as precise pitches in music. I've plenty enough heard egyptians sing 3/4 tones with absolute ease and precision, without "bending" anything.

Also be aware that any music that makes use of instruments which are limited to the harmonic series (such as most simple brass-like instruments) automatically produce pitches that have nothing to do with an equal octave-division, and notes such as the 11th harmonic have in such cultures also found entrance into other musical areas, such as singing.

While Persian and Arabic musicians have, in more recent times (and by recent I mean toward the beginning of the 20th century), have adopted 24-tone equal temperament -- mostly due to the introduction to and incorperation of equal-tempered instruments, the tunings, historically, are based on Pythagorean tunings. Now I'm not to sure about exact tuning in Arabic music, but Persian music was essentially based (and still is, depending on the musician) on Pythagorean limmas (90.22 cents, about 10 cents smaller than a half step) and Pythagorean/Just major seconds (203.91 cents, about 4 cents larger than an equal tempered whole step). As well, fifths are based on the third harmonic, so 701.96 cents as opposed to 700 cents. The "quarter tone", however fluctuates based on performance, mood, maqam/dastgah, etc. -- it rarely splits a step in half.

Basically, they don't really have a fixed temperament, more of fixed interval sizes. Either way, it results in an unequal tuning; its interesting to note that 2 "half steps" (90.22 cents), do not make a "whole step" (203.91 cents) -- its off by a Pythagorean comma (23.46 cents), which I believe is also used on occasion (though I'm not positive about that).

So I guess you could relate the "quarter-tones" to bending on a guitar, since the interval size isn't completely fixed, however the rest of the intervals are, and do not correspond to 12tET (so therefore microtonal). In addition, gamelan music (since it was also mentioned) uses a more or less 5tET as well as a 7-tone unequal temperament, both of which are far from 12tET and both of which definitely are not "ornaments".

Keep in mind here, that 12tET is an extremely "unnatural" tuning, most cultures tended to use Pythagorean and Just based tunings as these are more "natural" and could accurately be tuned. (There was no way of tuning 12 equal divisions 150 years ago, even in Western music.)

Ahh, good things to learn about those Persian/Arabic tunings, thanks!

Gardener,

I find the music so fascinating, and, as you've probably figured out, I'm a bit of a tuning-nut. I actually completed a paper on tuning in Persian music in December for a class -- there are actually 3 different tuning systems currently being used/discussed, all of which have their own unique characteristics! Its good stuff! Really interesting to hear the different ways of tuning a dastgah.

uhm so less knowledge do i have. cents? seconds? in the 21st century it should be placed around hz. Even if we have to dispose the old instruments.

imho every single instrument and note can be used as a tuning basis.

then in 12-tone-scale the higher-note is hz(lower-note) * 12th square-root of 2. (16th square-root of 2 if you have 16)

quite trivial.

i always thought i am (western music is) on a perfectly round scale...

i use modplug tracker to compose and hate that after only only 12 steps it repeats.

seems to me that the very core of music needs an upgrade.

Well, that's a problem of your modplug tracker (and, admittedly, a lot of other music software) then, not of the "core of music". As has been said, you are perfectly free to work with any sort of pitch-set, with octave identity or not, with equal interval sizes or not, whatever. When I write electroacoustic music I generally work with tone systems that I just invent for the individual piece anyways (without even octave-identity and without equal interval divisions), when I write for, say, Alphorn, then I naturally write for the harmonic series, and with other instruments it depends on what my focus is and what performers I'm working with (but I mostly base my music there still on 12TET, because it's exactly this limitation that has inspired me a lot lately).

The point is: You are free to base your music around different systems, as long as you're ready to cope with the problems of the instruments and performers that may arise (which is perfectly possible). But it's a bit unrealistic to ask the whole world of music to change towards some specific system (which you don't even describe in detail), when there's still so much interest of people in 12TET. Just do it yourself, and if other people are fascinated by it, they may follow.

The point is also that any sort of tone system is always a limitation of what could be possible. Unless you want to work merely with precise numbers in unlimited resolution (i.e. "now play a tone of 1023.429 Hz at 62 dB with a duration of 0.1283 seconds, with the following spectrum…"). But I think it's obvious that such a system would be highly impractical for human performers, so you do need some sort of grid system to simplify stuff. And then it all comes down to which grid system you choose, which all depends on your musical purposes. None of them is inherently better than another there. For one person, just working with the harmonic series of a single fundamental may be the appropriate thing. Another might be happy just work with octaves. A third, such as yourself, may want to use 16TET. A fourth, 12 tone meantone temperament. And so on. Can you really suggest a concrete system that would "upgrade" what we have now and still be some sort of "universal" and not just a system based on personal bias?

sorry for returning but music is that trivial

c

...music is an old inflexible religion.

I can't decipher the rest of your post, but must say I disagree completely with that part.

:whistling:

music is an old inflexible religion. besides you are musicians much more than composers. the 16 tone scale is superior mathematical (2 to the power of 4), much more round.

i think of polytonality and dissonance. imagine 13 tone dissonances.

just because you have to throw away all instruments is little regarding the new possibilities you gain.

"Inflexible religion" that you're still using. Or do you believe "polytonality" or "dissonance" are not entirely traditional terminology? If you want to do the entire opposite then you should as well stop talking about "tones in a scale," yet another concept you don't seem to mind from the "inflexible religion."

Also musicians much more than composers? I didn't know there was a distinction. So, what, you're not a musician but you're a composer?

Jeesh.

By the way: The 0 tone scale is most superior because no other number is as round as 0. Well, oval, but close enough.

The googol comes close though, with its pretty o's. Just think of the possibilities a googol tone scale would offer!

By the way: The 0 tone scale is most superior because no other number is as round as 0. Well, oval, but close enough.

Depends on your font, though.