Microtonal music

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Quadrangularus Reversum, a microtonal xylophone with wooden panels and bamboo resonators, similar to a marimba, developed by Harry Partch in 1965

Microtonal music works with microtonal intervals ; H. Intervals that are less than one semitone apart . Corresponding tones lying between the conventional pitches have always been used in classical music or in pop and jazz (in glissandi , portamenti, etc.), but we do not speak of microtonal music here. Rather, such music must be linked to a microtonal sound system or contain microtonal signs that are not only used sporadically. There do not necessarily have to be more than twelve tones per octave .

Demarcation

If out of tune guitars are used in musical styles, such as grunge rock, one speaks more of “microtonal elements” than of microtonal music.

history

11th to 20th centuries of the west

In the manuscript Montpellier MS H 159 (11th century), the pieces of Gregorian chant recorded there contain microtone marks that can be traced back to ancient Greek pitch marks. Gmelch gives as examples: Offertory: Afferentur, 198.3 and Graduale: Miserere mihi, 184.2 and 4. Gmelch writes on p. 11/12 about these special characters: “There can be hardly any doubt about their origin; they are constructed in exactly the same way as in the ancient Greek tone writing new characters were created by moving an original character, yes they are nothing more than ancient Greek tone characters and appear as such in the tables of Alypius from the 4th century AD ... Only those The meaning is different here. They will have to be related to non-diatonic pitches, which Guido von Arezzo speaks of in Chapter 10 of the Micrologus . ” Willi Apel suspected a microtonal reference for some neumes (salicus, oriscus and pressus) and referred to p. 122 f Montpellier H 159.

The microtonal characters occurring in Montpellier H 159 are:

Microton characters from the Montpellier H 159 manuscript

The mid-tone tuning of the Renaissance attempted to reconcile naturally pure thirds with almost pure fifths, but had to accept the so-called wolf fifth . In order to bypass these or to shift them to keys that are far away, some keys of the keyboard have been split. In 1558, Guillaume Costeley wrote a chromatic chanson , Seigneur Dieu ta pitié , which used 19 tempered steps per octave with microtonal intervals (63 cent steps).

Another approach to microtonal music came from the Italian Renaissance composer Nicola Vicentino , who used 36 keys per octave in the Archicembalo he developed . However, he was primarily interested in classical Greek music theory and the endeavor to use acoustically pure intervals within chromatic compositions. Gesualdo di Venosa used a similar instrument to compose his highly chromatic madrigals . The term “microton” was not yet known at that time.

Johann Kuhnau's harpsichord composition The Fight Between David and Goliath , written around 1700, uses the exotic intervals that arise in the mid-tone temperature, including the wolf fifth. Many baroque composers, such as François Couperin, follow this tradition .

A really “microtonal” composition ( Air à la grecque ) was written in 1760 by the flautist Charles de Lusse (* approx. 1723, † approx. 1774) for flute and bass . In the composition, which lasts only a little more than a minute, he repeatedly fills the flute's chromatic lines with quarter tones.

Experimenters such as Jacques Fromental Halévy , who wrote a work for soloists, choir and orchestra with quarter tones in 1849: Prométhée enchaîné (after Aeschylus ) are very rare .

The actual beginning of the expansion of the western tonal system must be seen in the early 20th century with composers like Ferruccio Busoni (he had a third- tone harmonium built for himself , but without composing for the instrument) or Charles Ives (use of quarter tones in various compositions).

Pioneers

Important pioneers of microtonal music in the early 20th century are e.g. B. Julián Carrillo , Alois Hába , Ivan Wyschnegradsky and Harry Partch . Others like Charles Ives or Béla Bartók only made sporadic, unsystematic use of quarter tones.

Non-European music systems

The term is also applied to music systems whose tuning is not based on Western semitones, including Indonesian gamelan music, classical Indian or classical Arabic music and classical Persian music . While the tone system of Western music divides the octave (frequency ratio 2: 1 to the fundamental) into 12 semitones , Indian music theory uses 22 microtones per octave. These are called Shruti . Such “quarter tones” are also used in Arabic and classical Persian music (more correctly understandable than 3/4 or 5/4 tones on a preceding reference tone).

Microtonal composition of the west

Many compositions in the 20th and 21st centuries use microtones. Two main strands can be observed: On the one hand, the octave is divided further, e.g. into 17, 19, 31, 53, 72 tempered steps (other solutions were also found individually), or the octave is divided asymmetrically (into differently sized pitch steps). This is particularly noticeable in all solutions that turn towards natural moods. Sixth, quarter or eighth tones are also used to write down various harmonic or melodic ideas. The abandonment of the octave as an irrevocable interval can also be observed. An example of this is the Bohlen-Pierce scale , which divides the duodecime (octave + fifth) into 13 steps and does not contain an octave.

Notation example

The most common microtonal signs are:

common microtone characters

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Joseph Gmelch: The quarter tone steps in the measuring tone of Montpellier , phil. Diss. Freiburg / Switzerland, Eichstätt 1911.
  2. ↑ In the short 10th chapter of the Micrologus , Guido speaks primarily of "falsitas in canendo" (wrong singing), and the use of neumes as transposition symbols for melodies.
  3. ↑ Willi Apel : Gregorian Chant, London undated (Burns & Oates), p. 110 ff.
  4. ↑ Jean During, Zia Mirabdolbaghi, Dariush Safvat: The Art of Persian Music . Mage Publishers, Washington DC 1991, ISBN 0-934211-22-1 , pp. 57-59.

Microtonal Researchers

Writings on microtonality have published:

Microtonal composers

See also

Web links

Commons : Microtonal Music  - collection of images, videos and audio files