I keep working my way closer to recording in strict just intonation. Here’s one I did today, of my song Breakup Songs. The acoustic guitar is in equal temperament, and the bass and vocals are untempered. I love singing harmony when the fretless bass is playing lattice notes. Sometimes I feel like I’m sliding…
I just recorded a new song, and it’s a perfect example of how equal temperament and just intonation can get along together. Here’s the cut: Reading this blog might give you the impression that I’m “against” equal temperament and “for” just intonation, or untempered music. True, discovering untempered music has been like sailing to…
The simplest untempered tuning of the major scale is: 1 — 0 cents 2 — 204 3 — 386 4 — 498 5 — 702 6 — 884 7 — 1088 Here’s how that tuning compares with the equal tempered scale: The black numbers show the pitches of 12-tone equal temperament. They are equally…
In harmonic space, the clearest name for each note is its ratio — 5/3, 3/2, 4/3, etc. Precise and unambiguous. But the ratios don’t give a very good idea of how to go about playing or singing those notes. There are a few instruments, such as the left hand keyboard on the accordion, that are…
Even though I love just intonation, I have a couple of problems with the term itself. One is grammatical. It’s a noun, and sometimes I want an adjective, as in “the just intonation version compared with the equal tempered version.” Kind of awkward. How else would you say this? “Justly intonated”? “The version in just…
I’ve been listening to yesterday’s chord progression showing off the b7. I think it offers an excellent opportunity to hear the difference between equal temperament and just intonation. Equal temperament works by implying or evoking a note rather than playing it exactly. There are dozens of singable notes per octave; ET represents them all with just…
For almost two years now, I’ve been exploring the nature of music almost full-time. I threw out everything I knew, started with the most basic thing I could think of, the number 1, the origin of the musical universe, and worked my way from there. My explorations quickly led to the underpinnings of musical harmony,…