Music everywhere?

[Colorful Mage]

And this is basically how music creates emotion in listeners. The jellybeans are consonances and the chalkboard scrapes are dissonances. There needs to be a consistency in style in order to create expectancies, but the real beauty and communication comes in how those expectancies are violated. But too many violations and the expectancies change.

Often times, though, the expectancies are a result of years of conditioning, though, non? I've read that accidentals are used to create surprise by played a note alien to the scale. Why not constantly use violations? When people grow accustomed to an accidental every couple of measures, that's when you stick to the original key for a while. Lull them into a false sense of security.

You ask me to choose between which is more important, what the audience is used to, or the original "intentions" of the composer. I do not see how these two things are mutually exclusive by any means. Bach composed the music with the standard pitches of his time; what he was used to. By leaving it there, in the times of his composing, it becomes something foreign to us. To him it was normal, to us it is flat. Rather, to see it as he did, we should transpose it to keys familiar to us. I feel that anything else is unfair to his music.
And, as such, I feel that the two questions you asked cannot have different answers. Both are vital to understanding Bach's music; we must hear it as he did by transposing it to a key used in our time.

As far as tuning your harpsichord, it is an instrument, a tool through which you create music. If you prefer to tune it one way, then that way is correct, is it not? Even if you were to tune it in a non-conventional way used by no one else, that would be fine. Anything someone does to an instrument intentionally is communication (within a certain degree - an infant randomly banging keys on an instrument has about the same communicative value as the infant squealing random syllables; that is, very little).

Sondance:

I was previously familiar with the melodic minor. I still do not fully understand why it returns the sixth and seventh to the key signature on its descention. Are you familiar with the history of the melodic minor scale?

Your explanation about your natural aversion to certain forms of modulation is very important to the topic of psychoacoustics. If you know of any pieces which are full of uses of the major seventh as a primary melodic note, than could you listen to them, and specifically pay attention to those parts? While you're doing that, write down what specifically it makes you feel. If there's tension anywhere in your body, record that. If there is a scraping sound in your head, write that down. Likewise, try to create artwork with only pastels. Try your best to completely desensitize yourself to both.

I'm not asking you to submit yourself to anything painful; if you'd rather not, that's perfectly fine. It's just that you seem like you know enough about the subject to accurately report to me how it feels. I'm very curious, and it seems like you can help me.

About the major/minor songs I was listening to - I actually enjoyed both pieces almost equally. To give a small backstory: I am a very anger-free person. Whenever I start to get angry (which is extremely rare), something reminds me of what I'm doing. I step out of the situation and look at the best course of action. If it coincides with my anger, then I act on it. However, if my logic disagrees with the anger, then I just... let the anger go. I think that the minor music allowed me to see that I was becoming (very slightly) angry, and then I knew to temporarily detach myself from the emotion.

Thank you both for your insight.

[Thomas Dressler]

Yes, the example I gave of jellybeans and chalkboard scraping is quite simplified in order to make the point. An understanding of the complex interplay of creating expectancies and violating them is an understanding of the history of musical style. I'd say that expectancies can be created both through years of conditioning, resulting in an overall style, or even era; and they can also be created in the short term, which is why we can readily adapt to individual composers' styles. You do seem interested in thinking about this, and I'd say Leonard B. Meyer's books will be useful to you at some point. You could try and see if you can understand his writing at this point, but if not, you will probably find them very useful in the future.

You will likely find a study of theory and harmony to be useful. It's not exactly true, at least in classical harmony, that an accidental is used for surprise. In classical harmony, notes are used in a way that corresponds to a very intricate set of rules of how to approach them, how to leave them, and which notes can be used under which circumstances. In Bach's harmony, notes ALWAYS have a reason for existing and are never introduced willy-nilly for shock value. Part of Bach's genius was in how he was able to stretch these rules to allow some very unusual harmonies at times.

Leonard B. Meyer talks about musical composition as involving certain strategies and decisions made within those strategies. What you described is a possible strategy for composing a piece of music, but just be aware that it is not one that fits with classical harmony. No problem, though. Part of the creative process could involve creating your own style. But much thought, experimentation, and experience are needed to make such a newly invented style work.

Your argument concerning tuning is an interesting one. But before going into it, I want to make sure you understand what I was writing about. There are two choices to be made: one is the pitch, and the other is the temperament. The pitch is what I think you're talking about. How high is middle A? Is it 440, or higher, or lower? The second, temperament, concerns the relationships between the notes. If you tune two different temperaments pitched at A=440, for example, the note E flat might be slightly different between the two temperaments, so in one temperament the key of E flat will sound more in tune than in the other one. If you want to know more about temperament, just ask and I'll try to explain. It's a fascinating subject.

Anyhow, I believe temperament is a more important issue than pitch, though there are some very important differences that pitch can bring to singing, especially. A good composer writes vocal music with the singer's register changes in mind, and no matter where the music is pitched, the breaks occur in the same place. So if, for instance, a Baroque composer wrote a piece for a tenor with a high F sharp, thinking it will be at the top of his chest register, the singer will have to sing it in head voice if the music is pitched at modern pitch. That could be a pretty significant problem, and actually IS a problem with some of the vocal solos in Handel's Messiah, for instance, if it's sung at modern pitch. There are some other, more subtle reasons, too.

But to me, the differences in temperament are even more outstanding. To play an early piece intended for Meantone temperament in modern equal temperament makes it sound profoundly different. And it is very important in my opinion to let go of the idea that modern is better. It's just different when it comes to art.

There are certainly preferences regarding temperament among modern musicians, and many prefer equal temperament. But I know of very few who actually like equal temperament on a harpsichord. This is not simply a subjective decision, because the richer overtones of the harpsichord make equal temperament clash more than it does on the piano. In equal temperament, none of the intervals are purely in tune, and this becomes obvious on the harpsichord. However, WHICH temperament you use is a subjective decision. I prefer Werckmeister, and Meantone for earlier pieces. The beauty of a harpsichord is that once you're experienced with tuning it, it's not such a big deal to comnpletely change the temperament in order to accomodate a different style or a particular group of composers.

Keep thinking about these things, because you ask good questions and you make good observations!

[Colorful Mage]

I am somewhat familiar with temperaments. I have to confess, however, that all of my knowledge of them is based off of discussions after class with my chorus teacher. As I understand it, modern pianos are tuned to equal temperament? And, I think it is because this makes it easy to play in any key? Or, if that is not the case, why are pianos (if they are) tuned to equal temperament?
I recognize the term Meantone, but not Werckneister. Are those generally used in instruments such as harpsichords, or are they also used in other instruments?
I think, if you would answer the above questions for me, that I would be comfortable enough to have a discussion about temperament. However, I did not consider temperament in my argument above. I was merely talking about the frequencies of the pitches, not the intervals between them. I do think that we should have the same temperament to play his pieces (because it does indeed sound different in a different temperament - my chorus teacher has an electric piano that allows him to play in any temperament, and I played with it some), but that we should change the pitch frequencies to something that is more comfortable to our ears. 440 A should be 440 A, not 414 A, or any other pitch.

(Small nitpicky detail: You mention that a tenor would have to go into head voice to sing a certain note; I thought it was called falsetto when a guy or girl was singing notes above their range, but that the term "head voice" only applied to a girl (as opposed to "chest voice"). This is how I was taught in chorus, and I'm curious to see if it is true or not.)

[Thomas Dressler]

Very interesting questions. I'm responding to this early in the morning in a motel room on my laptop. I shortly have to get ready to go and play and cantor an early Mass, but I think I'll respond to part of your post now, and I think later I'll start a seperate thread about temperament, perhaps on the organ forum because it's a very important issue for organists. I'll think on that today while I'm working and driving home. But let me respond to some of your questions here:

Concerning singing: There are many different ways to teach voice. I am familiar with something at least similar to what you're describing because my undergraduate voice class was taught pretty much that way. I, however, like voices trained in the old fashioned Italian style. I'll give a simplified explanation (because I don't have much time) and you can respond with more questions if you like.

The basic idea in real old fashioned bel canto singing (and EVERYBODY claims to teach bel canto, while only some have actually studied the old methods) is that all voices have register breaks. Voice teaching involves having the singer learn where they are, learn how the seperate registers work, and then through practice, to meld them together so they flow evenly from one to the other. I idea is NOT to have a complete even vocal quality from bottom to top, the actually quality of the voice changes however the strength and projection is even from bottom to top.

According to this method, all voices, women and men, have a register change between middle C and middle F (that is when you're pitched at A=440.) The raw chest voice can comfortably sing up to middle C. Strong head voice begins at middle F. The area in between is the difficulty, especially for some tenors, and needs to be negotiated through a muscular coordination that is often called middle voice or mixed voice. In some young male voices which have not developed, the notes above middle F can only be sung in falsetto, and that is part of the learning process. In general, some tenor voices are not mature until late 20s-into your 30s. I found vocal changes taking place when I was around 40.

This muscular coordination of the registers comes easily to some people and is difficult to others. If your voice naturally has difficulty negotiating the register breaks, unless you have a voice teacher who is well versed in this kind of teaching, you will always be a "baritenor" who does not have high notes.

I always teach my choirs to sing in this Italian way. I teach my women to allow their voices to have some strength on the bottom through using chest voice. Some teachers do not want their women to sing with chest color at the bottom, but I like the sound of the register changes, and it brings out the lines in Renaissance music where this kind of singing was just assumed.

Also, in this kind of singing, for men's voices, the falsetto is an integral part of the voice, it is not considered to be out of their range, it is part of their range. It is possible to seamlessly move up into falsetto if you're singing notes above middle F piano or pianissimo. So in this way of talking about singing, both men and women have chest and head voice, and men also have falsetto. Women have very light "Whistle tones" around high F which sort of correspond to falsetto for men.

Ok, gotta run, hope this helps some, but feel free to ask more questions.

[Thomas Dressler]

Wow, boy I don't write very well early in the morning! And the time has elapsed where I can edit my own post. . .oh well, try to see what I'm saying around the bad wording. . .

It's been a very tiring day, and I will try to get to the posting about temperaments tomorrow.

[Thomas Dressler]

Ok, the posting explaining temperament is now up in the Pipe Organ Forum.