[math-fun] Too-consonant music sounds bad
This piece dynamically adjusts the timbre of the instrument to make each chord sound consonant. http://sethares.engr.wisc.edu/mp3s/three_ears.html
He's got lots of other "weird" music, including non-12-tet scales and other things: http://sethares.engr.wisc.edu/otherperson/all_mp3s.html I particularly enjoyed "Truth on a Bus", written in a 19-tet scale.
-- Mike Stay - metaweta@gmail.com http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~mike http://reperiendi.wordpress.com
--interesting. I found "three ears" to be not very good to my taste. Locally it sounds good, but the global impression is unsatisfying and too "sappy happy elevator music." My music theory -- well, actually Rameau's "tension" music theory in this case -- contends that an overdose of consonance is not a good thing and makes music sound worse. You want cons+dissonance both. That theory is confirmed by my subjective impression of this piece. What think you all? http://sethares.engr.wisc.edu/mp3s/truthonabus.html is not trying for a consonance overdose, it is merely trying to be normal music but using a nontraditional 19-note scale. I find it better. But 19 is not a very good scale size, and as a result the whole piece sounds overall a bit too dissonant to me.
participants (1)
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Warren D Smith