Re: OT: Musical languistics

In a message dated 2003:06:02 03:12:15 AM, Adam Walker writes:

> [ . . . ] I've got some stuff from Zaire (or DR Congo) that is
>horrifying.  Oh the dissonant clamour!  It's like the
>stuff is going to amputate my cerebral cortex!
    LOL and I thought something was wrong with me. Good to know at least one
other person has the same _exact_ response.

>  I'd rather listen to 20th century "serious" classical.
>Yes even to THAT!
    ROTFLMAO. ::nods head in agreement while putting a Takemitsu CD::   Yes,
it's musics like these Central African musics that put big bloody bulletholes
in the whole "music is an universal language" romantic idealism.

    ::digs and rummages frantically - a la Kiki the Ferret - in his messy
music archives:: And here is a good sized nail to put in the coffin lid... ::BiG
GRiNNie::

    This is an email posted long ago to the Tuning List by Brian McLaren:

    Will Grant answered my statement that "Lou Harrison has not explained how
to reconcile these facts [that is, the prevalence of tunings which cannot be
explained easily in terms of small integer ratios in other cultures] with the
notion that just intonation forms the basis of world music." Will Grant
pointed out that "an arbitrary octave of 1150 cents does not preclude reference to a
just standard." Will's counter-argument is that "the music I've listened to
from Central Africa...relies on a 'gamut'... of a major third..." And that
"tetrachords carry inevitably a potential toward modulation... Nevertheless,
sharping thirds can be pleasant. (..) The central African musics aren't concerned
about melodic modulatory implications... Therefore I do not see that the
specific use of wide octaves can be used to discredit the theoretical notion of a
just standard." [Will Grant] Will makes some excellent points, with considerable
insight. First, Will G. is certainly right that in many parts of Africa the
overall "gamut" of pitch is somewhere in the neighborhood of a third. This is
not simply based on my listening, but on the research printed in the Journal of
Ethnomusicology, etc., the bulk of which supports Will Grant's statement--for
*many* African musics. However, this is not the case for *all* musical
traditions in Africa, and may not be the case for a majority. I don't know enough
about African music to decide whether a majority of the cultures use a gamut of
a third. However, I do know of several specific exceptions to that rule--and
where there are several excpetions to a general ethnomuiscological "rule,"
experience has taught me that there are apt to be many more. The "weeping song" of
the Gisalo, if memory serves, exceeds the compass of a third by a
considerable amount, and the ugubhu is typically played using harmonics up to 7. Second:
While Will Grant's argument is ingenious and very well thought out, it does
not appear to apply to the example cited in my post. Permit me to quote the full
text of my original citation: "This definition is refused by the practices to
quote the full text of my original citation: "This definition is refused by
the practices of these musicians, who tune their xylophones using adjacent
intervals, step by step. Our experimentation verified that 'perfect' consonances
are not a consituent of Central African concept of the scale. These musicians
do not judge a strict octave (1200 cents) to be better than a large major
seventh (1150 cents) in any rgister, probably because of the roughness it creates
on the octaves that are always played simultaneously with double sticks in each
hand." [Voisin, Frederic, "Musical Scales in Central Africa and Java:
Modeling by Synthesis," Leonardo Music Journal, Vol. 4, pp. 85-90, 1994] This
specific quote appears to crush most of Will Grant's objections. On the other hand,
it's possible that I've misunderstood of Will Grant's objections. On the other
hand, it's possible that I've misunderstood the text. In any case Will might
want to study the article in question in detail. Others examples (some outside
Africa): The panpipes of the 'Are-'are of the Solomon Islands are tuned in 7
equal-tempered tones to the octave which cannot be understood in terms of the
harmonic series (unless, of course, there's something I've overlooked or not
taken account of--always possible); the same seems to be true of the xylophones
of the Kwaiker indians of central Mexico and Guatamala. The Burmese oboe-like
instruments, the drums of the Akan in West Africa, and much of the vocal music
of the Kaluli of highland New Guinea and other music from sub-Saharan Africa
all seem to use pitches which systematically avoid just ratios. Of course the
most spectacularly non-just non-equal-tempered musical traditions are those of
Bali and Java, along with Thailand. No one has succeeded in explaining these
musical traditions in terms of small integer ratios, to the best of my
knowledge, and so my case seems to stand. However, it's quite possible I've made some
silly error or failed to see some crucial point. Perhaps Will Grant can show
me what I've overlooked. --mclaren

* note: if any of the music terminology above is confusing, one may go to
Monzo's microtonal music dictionary (also available as downloadable files) at:
http://sonic-arts.org/index.html

---
Hanuman Zhang, the "Yves Klein Bleu Aardvark"

Brett Campbell writes:
>>"After prolonged exposure to the rich, kaleidoscopic world of microtones,
>>returning to equal-tempered music was for me like going back to black and
>>white after spending a weekend immersed in color".
    What strange risk of hearing can bring sound to music - a hearing whose
obligation awakens a sensibility so new that it is forever a unique, new-born,
anti-death surprise, created now and now and now. .. a hearing whose moment in
time is always daybreak.  - Lucia Dlugoszewski

"The wonderousness of the human mind is too great to be transferred into
music only by 7 or 12 elements of tone steps in one octave." - shakuhachi master
Masayuki Koga

"There's a rabbinical tradition that the music in heaven will be microtonal
=)"  - one annotative interpretation of Talmudic writings

improvisation is "a process of liberation, a working around the assumptions
that define our civilization, and the results are open-ended." - John Berndt