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Re: what about simplifying music notation?


From: Michael Ellis
Subject: Re: what about simplifying music notation?
Date: Mon, 14 Mar 2011 11:53:30 -0400

On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 11:38 AM, Michael Ellis
<address@hidden> wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 14, 2011 at 11:06 AM, Francisco Vila <address@hidden> wrote:
>>
>> 2011/3/14 David Kastrup <address@hidden>:
>> > Francisco Vila <address@hidden> writes:
>> >> Frets in a guitar are absolutely chromatic.  I did not mention
>> >> fretless instruments.
>> >
>> > So please explain how you are would sort frets into a diatonic scale
>> > arrangement corresponding to white keys on a piano, with the frets
>> > corresponding to black keys put someplace else.
>>
>> I a sense, frets behave like buttons.
>>
>> > The frets in a guitar are not _deliberately_ designed around a chromatic
>> > scale, but because their positioning is dictated by physics.
>>
>> Still, frets behave somewhat like buttons.
>>
>> > Contrast that with a flute or a saxophone or anything else with a
>> > _deliberate_ design of controls.
>>
>> That's why I mentioned Stanley Jordan who percutes strings against the
>> fretboard only, thus allowing complex two-hand polyphony and making
>> frets look as if they were buttons :-))
>>
> I'm not familiar with Stanley Jordan's music but a guitar tuned by
> fifths,  like a cello or violin, has a very convenient relationship to
> diatonic scales because the first 3 modes (ionian, dorian, and
> phrygian)  have symmetric tetrachords starting on the 1st and 5th
> degrees of each mode.   See the diagram below.
>
>  HEAD
> ---------------
> .  .   .  .   .  .
> c g  d a  e b
> .  .   .  .   f  c
> d a  e b  .  .
> .  .   f  c  g d
> e b  .  .   .  .
> f  c  g d  a b
>
>
>
> So the major scale patterns are very easy to visualize.  Of course you
> need to have huge hands or play high on the neck to execute them
> without shifting.
>

Oops! Typo in last line of diagram.  Highest note is, of course, "e"
instead of "b".



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