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Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

bartoszmilewski.com

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Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#61

Post by dhosek »

fenwick67 wrote: post #58
mikorym wrote: post #42

I was expecting a bit more category theory. But I was glad to see that he alludes to the duality of minor chords and major chords. A simple way to look at it is like this: Pick two notes, i.e., an interval. Then pick a note in the middle of the two notes. The dual chord is the one where you swap the up and down chromatic distances. Then if you happened to pick a 5th interval, and you happened to pick the major 3rd as…

This is why I like the guitar/bass over the piano, because these relationships show themselves when you play. On a piano, if you go from C to E# the hand shape is totally different than A to C, even though the intervals are the same, so this relationship isn't intuitive.

I'm guessing that you learned guitar before piano? My first instrument was piano and I don't really think about hand shape when I play chords on it. My internal visualization of music is primarily founded on a piano keyboard with musical staves as secondary.

I will say that playing multiple musical instruments gives the same kind of multiple ways of looking at a thing that multiple programming languages does. One of the things that was a little strange for me when I first picked up the flute was the idea that lower notes were further away from me as opposed to being closer the way that I was used to thinking of them with bass (particularly double bass which was my first stringed instrument). Meanwhile, on brass instruments, different pitches don't really have any spatial location at all.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#62

Post by dhosek »

dhosek wrote: post #61
fenwick67 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I like the guitar/bass over the piano, because these relationships show themselves when you play. On a piano, if you go from C to E# the hand shape is totally different than A to C, even though the intervals are the same, so this relationship isn't intuitive.

I'm guessing that you learned guitar before piano? My first instrument was piano and I don't really think about hand shape when I play chords on it. My internal visualization of music is primarily founded on a piano keyboard with musical staves as secondary. I will say that playing multiple musical instruments gives the same kind of multiple ways of looking at a thing that multiple programming languages does. One of…

(I'd also add that while I can play multiple instruments, I don't necessarily play most of them well).

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#63

Post by spopejoy »

dehrmann wrote: post #2

> The first such transformation is to lower the third by one step to obtain a minor triad. For some reason, we perceive minor chords as sad or melancholy, sometimes a bit whiny. I'd love to hear more on "some reason." In a way, it's so arbitrary, and maybe it's a cultural bias, but so sad. And the minor iv chord, so sad. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQFtvAfHndE , right when he sings "when September ends," but ther…

One thing is minor is unquestionably more dissonant than major; a major chord (in just intonation) is one of the most powerful sounds in existence which is why Baroque music almost always ends on major -- ie not to "sound happy" but to end with a bang.

This dissonance is related to why a composer like Bach has many, many compositions in minor (and massive ones like the B-minor mass), but not much later, you see composers using minor less and less as they moved towards more consonance (along with modulation of course).

For instance, in all of Mozart's violin sonatas there's only one minor. And it's freaking awesome ... but he didn't want to write more than that.

I think that while dissonance was interesting to Bach, it was less so through the rest of the common period, so that favors major.

I would also add that Salsa as a genre uses minor keys for happy tunes all the time.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#64

Post by fenwick67 »

dhosek wrote: post #61
fenwick67 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I like the guitar/bass over the piano, because these relationships show themselves when you play. On a piano, if you go from C to E# the hand shape is totally different than A to C, even though the intervals are the same, so this relationship isn't intuitive.

I'm guessing that you learned guitar before piano? My first instrument was piano and I don't really think about hand shape when I play chords on it. My internal visualization of music is primarily founded on a piano keyboard with musical staves as secondary. I will say that playing multiple musical instruments gives the same kind of multiple ways of looking at a thing that multiple programming languages does. One of…

I took piano lessons at age 9 for about a 6 months but it never really took and I didn't practice. I played trombone for 3 years junior high, but didn't really practice then, either. Then I took music theory and composition classes in college, which revealed to me that thinking in intervals and scale degrees made way more sense to me than staves and note names. At that point bass and guitar clicked and really complemented that way of thinking.

I should also add I'm really only competent at one instrument which is bass guitar, probably because I played in a church praise band for a bit which made me actually have a reason to practice.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#65

Post by jmiskovic »

mikorym wrote: post #42

I was expecting a bit more category theory. But I was glad to see that he alludes to the duality of minor chords and major chords. A simple way to look at it is like this: Pick two notes, i.e., an interval. Then pick a note in the middle of the two notes. The dual chord is the one where you swap the up and down chromatic distances. Then if you happened to pick a 5th interval, and you happened to pick the major 3rd as…

I've read your post several times and I don't get how this duality is useful and how to apply it.

The "duality" of major/minor seems very different that "duality" of 4th and 5th. One completely changes music harmony, while other is basically interchangeable. When is it useful to think in these terms?

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#66

Post by zozbot234 »

adelrune wrote: post #46
nicetryguy wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still think its fair to say we use the equal temperment system. It is a widely accepted standard. You're right, fret pressure alone can absolutely raise the pitch 5/10 cents, my Gibson SG has some deep frets and can do double that. I am surprised with all of the technology and VSTs we have now no one really uses self adjusting Just intonation or challenges A 440. Musical / mathematical / technical ability are a rar…

William Sethare has done a good amount of research into adaptatively tuning music so that the intervals are always simple ratios. You can find some examples of this here : https://sethares.engr.wisc.edu/html/soundexamples.html Unfortunately some sound examples are missing but a few of them are still online.

I'm not seeing any dead links there? That page has always been a listing of the mp3 files on the physical CD that comes with his book, only some of which were ever put online.

BTW, Sethares' research https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Sethares goes way beyond tuning music to simple ratios. His whole book is about working with a model of sounds being "in tune" with one another that doesn't just boil down to that.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#67

Post by mikorym »

jmiskovic wrote: post #65
mikorym wrote: post #42

I was expecting a bit more category theory. But I was glad to see that he alludes to the duality of minor chords and major chords. A simple way to look at it is like this: Pick two notes, i.e., an interval. Then pick a note in the middle of the two notes. The dual chord is the one where you swap the up and down chromatic distances. Then if you happened to pick a 5th interval, and you happened to pick the major 3rd as…

I've read your post several times and I don't get how this duality is useful and how to apply it. The "duality" of major/minor seems very different that "duality" of 4th and 5th. One completely changes music harmony, while other is basically interchangeable. When is it useful to think in these terms?

Exactly because they have effects that sound different and are instances of the same general principle.

Edit: The idea is not to stop there. You also have the minor 7th chord being dual to the major 7th chord (with the octave added implicitly). Those two chords are often used together in jazz music. In this case the interval you use to get the upper note is a 4th. And depending on which interval you are focusing on, and what kind of scale you use (if not chromatic) this simple concept can get much more interesting.

I agree that playing for example C E G and then C Eb G sounds like a "change", but I don't think the theory gives you complementary chords in sequence. They connect ideas with each other. In that sense it makes sense for a major chord to be dual to a minor chord.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#68

Post by bobbiechen »

dhosek wrote: post #61
fenwick67 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is why I like the guitar/bass over the piano, because these relationships show themselves when you play. On a piano, if you go from C to E# the hand shape is totally different than A to C, even though the intervals are the same, so this relationship isn't intuitive.

I'm guessing that you learned guitar before piano? My first instrument was piano and I don't really think about hand shape when I play chords on it. My internal visualization of music is primarily founded on a piano keyboard with musical staves as secondary. I will say that playing multiple musical instruments gives the same kind of multiple ways of looking at a thing that multiple programming languages does. One of…

My first instrument was also piano (classical). I never really thought of hand shape while playing chords either, but I understand the parent comment - since your hand position does change, it makes the absolute key much more important, and it makes it more difficult to see the relative jumps.

I don't think I ever had a good feel for how chords relate to each other before I started playing the accordion recently. On the left hand of an accordion, every chord interval is identical - C major to D major is just two positions away, exactly the same as D major to E major. It's also arranged in the circle of fifths, so any chord progression can be arbitrarily transposed (until you run out of range on the ends) That really helps me feel how chords progress and for the first time I'm feel comfortable playing chords by ear in real-time.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#69

Post by deirdresm »

thanatropism wrote: post #51
TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Microtonal music really isn't hard to find. It's just not very popular, because it's too niche for mainstream listeners. And most popular VSTs - Serum, Pigments, Massive, Phaseplant - all use wavetables and not 'the same old square and saw waves.' Modern pop really isn't any more generic than 30s/40s jazz, 50s rock and roll and bubblegum, and so on. That's why it's called popular music and not experimental music.

There's a def "greatest hits" effect with jazz. I mean, how awesome is "Minnie the Moocher", etc. There's also a "trailblazer" effect which is kind of weird because it doesn't happen in classical music. Namely that we listen a lot more to Miles Davis and Coltrane than the random swing band of their age. Heck, Miles gets more props than the sublime big band swing of Duke Ellington.

Honestly, out of all the things I've been paid for over the many years of my career, the one that gives the the most pleasure, thinking back, is being paid as an extra for The Blues Brothers.

Watching Cab Calloway do Minnie the Moocher in the 70s? Live? Paid for it? Priceless.

Working for Apple was awesome, as were the other places I've worked, but for sheer enjoyment per dollar, the Palladium in the 70s wins.

Re: Guitar Decomposed: 5. Mutating the Third

#70

Post by BartoszMilewski »

recursive wrote: post #8
dehrmann wrote: post #2

> The first such transformation is to lower the third by one step to obtain a minor triad. For some reason, we perceive minor chords as sad or melancholy, sometimes a bit whiny. I'd love to hear more on "some reason." In a way, it's so arbitrary, and maybe it's a cultural bias, but so sad. And the minor iv chord, so sad. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQFtvAfHndE , right when he sings "when September ends," but ther…

> lower the third by one step to obtain a minor triad But it's lowered by a half step...

Good point, it is ambiguous. I changed it to "semitone."
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