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Chromatone – Visual Music Language

chromatone.center

11–20 of 97 posts

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#11

Is there an easy-to-digest overview or even examples anywhere? I see a bunch of pretty deep-dive articles, a long video, a lot of tools, but I can't see a description of how the supposed visual language works yet, or even examples. How does this system represent notes and chords over time?

[flagged]

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#12
The most compelling use of color in music theory that I've encountered is a color scheme where individual notes are given primary colors (yellow, red, blue) like this:

C is yellow, C#/Db is red, D is blue, D#/Eb is yellow,...etc

First observation: the notes of each of the three diminished tetrads are monochromatic (their notes all have the same color.)

Then, look at the major minor triads and assign them secondary colors (purple, orange, green) depending upon the colors of their constituent notes.

So, for example the C major and C minor triads are both orange chords. F major and F minor triads are green chords. E minor and E major triads are green chords, etc.

This is a scheme that Tom Glazebrook calls "metaharmony", and he uses it in the context of studying the Barry Harris approach to Jazz, but it's actually isomorphic to Erno Lendvai's "Axis Theory" analysis of the music of Bela Bartok. (The secondary colors correspond to the T, D, and S functions.)

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#14
post #9

Is there an easy-to-digest overview or even examples anywhere? I see a bunch of pretty deep-dive articles, a long video, a lot of tools, but I can't see a description of how the supposed visual language works yet, or even examples. How does this system represent notes and chords over time?

[flagged]

[flagged]

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#15

Is there an easy-to-digest overview or even examples anywhere? I see a bunch of pretty deep-dive articles, a long video, a lot of tools, but I can't see a description of how the supposed visual language works yet, or even examples. How does this system represent notes and chords over time?

The github repo explains the site a little, it seems https://github.com/chromatone/chromatone.center

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#16

Is there an easy-to-digest overview or even examples anywhere? I see a bunch of pretty deep-dive articles, a long video, a lot of tools, but I can't see a description of how the supposed visual language works yet, or even examples. How does this system represent notes and chords over time?

[flagged]

[deleted]

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#17

browser shows this permission popup: chromatone.center wants to control and reprogramme your MIDI devices. [Allow/Block] off-topic: is "reprogramme" a british spelling - dont remember seeing this spelling in a long time.

In contemporary British English “program” is used for the computation-related senses. “Programme” is used for all the other senses, e.g. a concert programme.

Using “reprogramme” in a computation context is very old-fashioned and would be considered nonstandard spelling these days. I suspect this is someone taking BrE localisation too seriously or it’s a non-British person’s idea of what British English is.

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#18

Is there an easy-to-digest overview or even examples anywhere? I see a bunch of pretty deep-dive articles, a long video, a lot of tools, but I can't see a description of how the supposed visual language works yet, or even examples. How does this system represent notes and chords over time?

[deleted]

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#19

browser shows this permission popup: chromatone.center wants to control and reprogramme your MIDI devices. [Allow/Block] off-topic: is "reprogramme" a british spelling - dont remember seeing this spelling in a long time.

I got that too, but had never seen that permission before.

I just went ahead and allowed it.

Current best practice is not to ask permissions like that (location, notifications, or programming midi devices) on landing, but to stick them behind an interaction like a toggle or button press.

Re: Chromatone – Visual Music Language

#20
What is it? The web site doesn't work (FF, Windows & macOS). If they really propose replacing pitch by color, how are they going to get people to tell minute differences apart? How are they going to display chords, or polyphony? Octaves? And as if written notation doesn't exclude enough people, they're now also excluding color-blind people, some 5% of the male population where I live.
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