Today I'm going to play about a half an hour of music by an assortment of composers who have posted announcements of their pieces on the Yahoo Group, Make Micro Music. This is a mailing list of composers who like to make microtonal music, like to talk about making microtonal music, and like to let others of similar interest listen to their work. If you are listening to this podcast, I'd recommend that you join the group to be notified when someone has created a new piece. I've accumulated a ton of great microtonal music this way, and today's podcast features eight great pieces announced on the list, plus one of mine, and an archive recording of Harry Partch.

The theme of thepisode is "Neo-Medieval Music", from a post by Daniel Wolf on his blog. Talking about Margo Schulter, another composer we will hear from later in the program, Daniel writes:

Margo Schulter has specialized in the nexus between medieval and renaissance tuning concepts and voice leading practice in early repertoire, both analytically and synthetically, through locating unexplored potential in historical practice for new work. Her impressive, if modest-in-scale, compositions are in a style which she identifies as neo-medieval, featuring deliciously subtle alternative tunings. To a certain extent, it is a kind of historical fiction, imagining a music that could have happened in 1300 or 1400 had history taken a slightly different course in the generations after Perotin or Machault. Ms. Schulter, although working outside of the academy, is one of the most rigorous and thorough scholars out there, and, in addition, is one of the most generous spirits in the contemporary music world, paying attention to the work of others with rare intensity and always more interested in fruitful collaboration than in competition.

Indeed. Kind of like an alternative history novel. Let's hear some examples, shall we?

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First up are two songs posted by Aaron Krister Johnson: Juggler and Adagio for Margo. Aaron writes that Adagio for Margo is his take on Margo Schulter's 'neo-medieval' style. He describes the piece as follows:

Thanks Margo, for your inspirational discussions and exploration of this subject! I used two soundfonts from the "Early Patches" set--a hammered dulcimer sound, layered with an alto recorder sound. The soundfonts were loaded into the 'fluidsynth' software engine, and run through a software effects rack (jack-rack) which hosted my favorite effects plugin: Freeverb. I was using the Jack low-latency audio server under Linux. I used my custom software to 'compile' the MIDI file, and again custom software to play it, both written in Python. Speaking of which, the tuning is 17-edo....did anyone guess that? It's been said here before, but 17-edo, I have to agree, has nice narrow semitones--good for melodic lines.

Listen now to Adagio for Margo by Aaron Krister Johnson.

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About The Juggler he writes.

The Juggler nicely represents the main strands of my compositional personality at once: The predilection for neo-Bachian counterpoint, but with a modern twist, using asymmetrical time signatures and changing meters, and of course, a fascination for non-12 per octave tunings. The tuning here is 19-Tone-Equal-Temperament also known as 19 Equal Divisions of the Octave. This intonation has rich harmonic resources, and a wonderfully vibrant and insistent energy. The title was arrived at after the composing. The music conveys what I feel when I watch a skilled juggler at work on his/her "aerial counterpoint"!

Listen now to The Juggler by Aaron Krister Johnson

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Jon Lyle Smith is a composer who has posted notices of his new pieces many times over the past few months. They are all wonderful microtonal explorations. Today I'm going to play three. The first is his Trio In G Major. He writes:

A light & airy souffle of neo-classical tonality, served with generous portions of just intonation. High in empty calories, low in proteins. Contains no outre intervals. Suitable for those on a bland diet.

Here is Trio in G Major by Jon Lyle Smith.

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Next up is another piece by Jon Lyle Smith - Apollonian Dance He describes this work on his site as follows:

Inspired by ancient Greek music. Based on a tuning by Ptolemy: 1/1 - 9/8 - 7/6 - 4/3 - 3/2 - 63/40 - 7/4 - 2/1 For soprano recorder, 'ud, cittern, frame drum.

Listen now to Apollonian Dance by Jon Lyle Smith.

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And now for the third of Jon Lyle Smith's works today, his Prelude No 1. Jon writes

Quiet & contemplative piano prelude, composed in a symmetrical octatonic scale with 7/4 meter. Tuning is 1/6 -comma meantone.

Great stuff. Jon Lyle Smith and Prelude No. 1.

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Next up is another piece in the growing genre of neo-medieval music

Margo Shulter describes her work as follows:

Hello, everyone, and I'm pleased to report that more music is available in Sagittal notation: a piece called _O Europae_ which I composed in the context of this group in 2004, when it was announced here that the European Union was expanding to 25 members, and that this might be a fitting subject for some compositions.

The score is available on her web site with a link to the PDF file here.

Listen now to Margo Schulter's O Europae.

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Next up is a piece performed by a real live musician. Dante Rosati describes the Prime Guitar he used to play the next piece,Tarkovsky's Mirror, on his web site:

The first guitar I refretted, the 21-Tone Just Intonation Guitar, used a 21 note scale derived from the harmonic series, using pitches up to the 7 prime limit, and with the scale repeating throughout the range of the instrument. After that, I wanted a guitar that would enable me to play in the harmonic series without limitations, so I next refretted an instrument into the Harmonic Series Guitar (webpage to follow). Being able to play partials like 11, 13, 17 and other higher primes was quite interesting, and I found myself wondering if an instrument could be designed that would play only higher prime partials.

The Prime Guitar is designed to play prime partials 17-199. The lowest string is tuned to the 17th partial of a series, and the successive strings are then tuned to partials 23, 37, 47, 67, and 89 to preserve the basic tonal spread of a standard set of guitar strings. Because the lowest partial is 17, there are no familiar intervals like octaves, fifths, thirds, etc., which are all lower prime limit intervals. Nevertheless, some intervals between higher primes approximate the lower prime limit intervals (e.g. 61/31), without of course reproducing them exactly. This gives the guitar a unique sound that can be heard in this piece composed and recorded on this instrument:

Listen now to Dante Rosati and his Tarkovsky's Mirror.

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Hudson Lacerda posted this improvisation back in November when he wrote on the Yahoo Make Micro Music group list:

George Secor's 17-tone well temperament is simply fantastic! You all definitely need try it! The qualitative differences from 17-EDO are really strong (forget the harshness of 17-EDO intervals), and there are very interesting and effective consonances/dissonances based on 3 7 9 11 13. The improvisation is new-age-like, but I think it shows a bit of the harmonic and melodic potentials of 17WT.

Listen now to Hudson Lacerda perform his improv.

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The last piece is one of mine that I've played once before on the microtonal podcast, back in October of 2005. Forgive me if you've heard this before. I scored it for Balloon Drums, Oboe, Flutes, Guitar, and Finger Piano. The piece starts out with a simple chord progression for the winds, with finger piano bass, that sounds rather conventional. But some of the intervals are not what they appear. As the piece moves on, I use glissandi to drift from one to the other, to showcase how un-12-tone the tuning is.

The balloon drums are made from a four foot long sewer pipe with a balloon membrane over one end. I recorded one and use Csound to bring it up in pitch. Each note played on the balloon drum is actually 5-10 strikes of the drum separated by a few milliseconds. It gives it a sense of many drummers playing at once.

Listen now to Balloon Drum Music by Prent Rodgers.

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The final sound clip is taken from Innova Records DVD called Enclosure Seven: Harry Partch. This DVD includes several recording of Partch talking about his instrument. I couldn't resist including this clip from his description of the Boo. It's all Harry, at his sexy best.

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That's it for now podcatchers. Let's hope it won't be another eight months before the next one!

Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 2.5.

In part two of the Microtonal Music Day 2006 podcast, we're going to hear from 12 more microtonal composers, in another feast of microtonality. As I said in yesterday's installment, this podcast is a result of the efforts of dozens of composers and musicians who feel that microtonal music deserves wider recognition. The idea was hatched on the Making Microtonal Music Yahoo Groups mailing list, and has grown thanks to the efforts of that group. The idea is to pick a day, and just "flood the zone" with microtonal music, compose, play, share, and get someone to listen to microtonal music. Of course, we should do this every day, but today is an opportunity to really focus. Think of it as the black history month for microtonality.

Table of Contents:

1. Rick McGowan - 5min-sym-15tet
2. Rosencrantz the Sane - Nothing of any importance
3. Yahya Abdal-Aziz - Bunga Seroja
4. Jon Szanto - Do Something
5. Bill Sethares - Clariphonics Group
6. Prent Rodgers - Trumpet Songs 5 & 6
7. Magnus Jonsson & Jim Redfern - Anticperience
8. Jon Lyle Smith - Wind Rider
9. Gene Ward Smith - Dreyfus
10. Hans Straub - Asimchimsaia
11. Jacob Barton - Hyperimprovisation
12. Jeff Harrington - Spirale d'Arco for Sax Quartet

For complete show notes, see the Bumper Music Podcast site.
In today's podcast, we're going to hear from 10 microtonal composers, in a feast of microtonality. This podcast is a result of the efforts of dozens of composers and musicians who feel that microtonal music deserves wider recognition. This is part 1. Tommorrow we'll try to get part 2 up with the other 13 composers who are participating in Making Microtonal Music Day 2006. In today's podcast, you can hear from:

1. Harry Partch Reading
2. Bill Sethares - MysteryX
3. Margo Schulter - In Hora Observationis
4. Graham Breed - MMMDay06
5. Joe Monzo - Theme from "Invisible Haircut"
6. Chuckk Hubbard - Big Giant Worms
7. Jon Lyle Smith - Piano and Trio in D#
8. Dave Seidel - Drift Dhikr
9. Anthony Kozar - FMScape no. 1
10. Daniel Anthony Stearns - Day Walks In

More is on the way!

I have a real treat for today's podcast. I'm going to play four different microtonal pieces by four different composers, all for solo piano. Each was done using a different set of techniques to retune the piano, with different intonation systems, and all showcase the world between the 1:1 and the 2:1.

The first is by Aaron Krister Johnson, with a piece called Study for Kyle Gann. Here's what Aaron wrote about the piece:

In honor of his wonderful neo-Nancarrow work on the 'Studies for Disklavier' disk, I make this humble offering and dedicated it to Kyle Gann, the spirit of Conlon Nancarrow, and the inspiring 'impossible keyboard technique' made possible by the same.

There's a real nice 5 against 3 at the one minute and 45 seconds point, which really gets me up and going. Listen now to Study for Kyle Gann by Aaron Krister Johnson. Play song Nice ending there, with an acknowledgement to Conlon Nancarrow, Kyle Gann, and Bud Powell, all wraped up in a bow. Next up is a piece by Kyle Gann, the same Kyle Gann as was the target of Aaron's piece. Kyle is the music critic for the Village Voice and an associate professor of music at Bard College. This work is described by Kyle as follows:

Hello, gang, I've got a new piece, my first ever in 13-limit tuning. The tuning is simply all the ratios of whole numbers from 1 to 13, and the title is brbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbr) Triskaidekaphonia (rim shot) Dedicated to Aaron Krister Johnson for inspiring me to get to work on it.

• Tuning details here.
• Keyboard score as PDF here.
• Blog entry here.

A simple piece, over a drone, but it's taken a long time to get those 13-based intervals in my head. Enjoy!

Listen now to Triskaidekaphonia by Kyle Gann Play song.

Next up is my piece called Resolution in Blue for Microtonal Slide Piano. This piece explores what would happen if a piano had a wammy bar, a few dozen notes per octave, and a swell pedal. It's in just intonation, based on the tonality diamond to the 11 limit. The title, Resolution in Blue, is the diplomatic language at the UN for a permanent resolution. The security council uses this when it has a resolution read for a vote, when they are ready to remain siezed of the matter.

Play song.

The final piece is by Jeff Harrington for 19 tone piano, called Prelude #2. It is part of a series of four preludes Jeff wrote to be played together. I've played all four previously on a podcast. Today I'm just going to play the second one, since it has a lot in common with the other pieces I played today.

Play song.

Thanks for listening, Podcatchers!

An excerpt from a work in progress, from the baritone aria in the Opera: The War on Terror.

Today's podcast is a performance of my latest piece, called Balloon Drum Music. It is scored for Balloon Drums, Oboe, Flutes, Guitar, and Finger Piano. The piece starts out with a simple chord progession for the winds, with finger piano bass, that sounds sort of like this:

• Bb major
• Eb major
• G minor
• and so on.

When it is played, it sounds like a conventional progression. But in actuality, the chords are from the Partch Tonality Diamond, and their names in Sagittal notation are shown on the blog post at podcast1024.libsyn.com. There are notes in each key that are in common with the next key, and some that are slightly different. Some are off by very small ratios, and at later points in the piece when the flutes and oboe slides from one to another, the slide is unsettling to the non-microtonal ear.

For example, in the movement of chords from the B 16/9 major to the D 8/7 major, the B 16/9 goes down by 27:28 to fifth of the D 8/7 chord, which is A 12/7. There's another movement of a 35:36 and a 15:14. Each of these movements are decidedly different from conventional 12 tone equal temperment, whose minor second pitches approximate a 15:16. But even with these movements, the chords sound rather conventional at the start of this piece. When the slides come in, things get more microtonal.

The oboe has the ability to be in more than one place at the same time in this piece, or think of it as two oboists. The timbre of the oboe is subject to some alteration by choosing samples that are higher or lower than originally recorded. The result is kind of an English Horn sound, or sometimes like an angry cat.

As with most of my pieces, this one has a lot of indeterminacy. Each instrument can choose what to play next, by selecting from many alternative pitch and rhythm sequences. There are programmatic controls that drive the choice of sequences either towards or away from repetition.

The basic structure of the piece is a chord progression as a bridge between the longer sections of B 16/9 major. There are lots of triads based on 4:5:6 overtones, or 7:9:11, or slides between the two. These triads alternate in the chords and arpegiations. Other chords take advantage of wider intervals, like the 5:7:11:16, 6:9:13:20, 8:11:18:24, and other quasi fourth-based intervals.

The balloon drums are made from a four foot long sewer pipe with a balloon membrane over one end. I recorded one and use Csound to bring it up in pitch. Each note played on the balloon drum is actually 5-10 strikes of the drum separated by a few milliseconds. It gives it a sense of many drummers playing at once.

Listen now to a version of Balloon Drum Music by Prent Rodgers.

I think this one is just about ready. Here's a section from version 2 at 3:40 in. Note the flutes. Nice octave shift. Everything is moving either geographically or glissandiacally

This is some more bumper music. Today's entry includes slides from one key to the next in the bridge. It takes what used to sound rather conventional, and makes it into a catfight in Arabia. Or something like that.

Today's podcast is bumper music. Just something to cleanse your audio pallette. There are some balloon drums in this work-in-progress.

Today's podcast will be a bit longer than usual, since I'm going to play the works of several composers - music by Joe Pehrson, Aaron Krister Johnson, and Christopher Bailey.

But first, some words of advice from Eve Beglarian, who was profiled on a podcast put together by the talented composer Corey Dargel. His podcast, called Composers and the People Who Love Them, is a terrific collection of viewpoints on one composer by a variety of personalities. And they are quite the personalities. I'm going to play a clip of Eve being interviewed by Professor Heebie McJeebie:

Play clip.

I agree with Eve.

On to the musical numbers. First up is Joe Pehrson. He writes about Inner Voices:

Inner Voices is my first electronic piece which uses software, rather than hardware, synthesizers. I'm using the z3ta+ softsynth which reads "Scala" tuning files. Therefore, virtually any intonation can be realized. In this piece, I use the Blackjack scale, a 21 note scale which very closely emulates just intonation (non-beating intervals) within a margin of 2 or 3 cents. The z3ta+ is a very flexible softsynth and I use no presets: all the sounds are especially created. Sonar is my sequencer host and a second software synth, the TTS-1 creates percussion effects. I use quite a few of these, since they are handled so nicely by this second synth. I'm currently completing a version for electronic playback and 2 live percussionists.

Listen to Inner Voices by Joe Pehrson.

Next piece is by Aaron Krister Johnson, and is a suite of Four Pieces for Harpsichord:

• Praeludium distretto
• Contrapunctus null
• Eat My Two-Against-Three
• ADD Crisis Center

Here's how he described them:

3rd of August, 2005- four new works for 2/5-comma meantone tuned harpsichord. A note about the improvisations: I often do them in real-time at about half tempo, then, for a Nancarrow-like effect, they are sped up in tempo. But, yes; they are improvised real-time. And occasionally I'll fix a sloppy flam or something like a note not being held long enough which sounded choppy, etc.

Listen now to Four Pieces for Harpsichord by Aaron Krister Johnson.

The final piece of the podcast is a fun romp by Christopher Bailey called "Post-industrial Nuclear Thrash Mutated Smurfette JumpFest" by Christopher Bailey. He describes it as follows:

I did it in ProTools, with a few basic plug-ins, samples, and an XV-3080 Synth. It's not systematically microtonal, just lots of random pitch-bends added to juice up the pitches. Plus a lot of the samples are kind of weirdly colored sonorities. Beyond that, I suppose the title speaks for itself.

Listen now to music by Christopher Bailey, "Post-industrial Nuclear Thrash Mutated Smurfette JumpFest". Great stuff.