On Nov 27, 2007 8:44 PM, Trevor Bača <
address@hidden> wrote:
Hi Libero,
> wikipedia article call those time sigs as "irrational" meters:
It's unfortunate (IMO) that such a (mathematical) misnomer has become
accepted...
Agreed.
I think Ferneyhough uses the term only with reluctance; Xenakis refused ...
Ok, but it is a metaphor, not a mathematical explanation and many music definitions are metaphoric... that's why Xenakis refused, he was less on the rethorical side -:)
(I really respect his music and life... just a little irony).
"irrationals" are the bar lenght whose beats are based on irregular groups (and incomplete... 5/5=1). To me the analogy is quite understandable, even if not correct.
I wish I knew enough about Medieval music (or Medieval music theory anyway) to know if the Medieval invetors of "duplum" and "triplum" and "perfectus" and "imperfectus" and the like ever touched on the topic ... they'd make a good source to steal from ...
Anyway, complex ars subtilior music was written without the notion of measure, and thus even for the most "irrationals" passages of the time, there was not this problem (the problem to write a special time signature, I mean, to fit all voices in a measure).
(A good example is "prolation" ... which I *think* Ferneyhough borrows from "prolatio" ... though not sure ... and which makes a great cover term for tuplets and all forms of duration "scaling" in general.)
Well, I dont have here a copy of Henry Cowell's book, maybe there is a better definition there, when he speaks about complex rhythmical subdivisions.
Could someone check it?
A question: in english language, do you say "Irrational rhythm"?
I'm not asking if this is correct or not, just if it is the common practice.
In italy we call them "Irregular groups"! Xenakis would have correctly argued that in a quintuplet there's nothing irregular, I mean, that the subdivision is in 5 equal parts...
Ciao
Libero
--
Trevor Bača
address@hidden