From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Microtonal music is a term for music which uses microtones -- intervals of less than a semitone, or as Charles Ives put it, the "notes between the cracks" of the piano. The term is less frequently used to refer to any music whose tunings are not based on semitones, such as gamelan music and Indian classical music. An alternative term, explicitly covering such possibilities, is xenharmonic music.
Some composers of modern avant-garde music have embraced the use of microtonal scales, dividing an octave into 19, 31, 43, 72 and other numbers of pitcheses, rather than the more common 12. The intervals between pitches can be equal, creating an equal temperament, Large and small as in meantone systems, or unequal, such as in just intonation.
Pioneers of modern Western microtonal music include:
- Béla Bartók
- Easley Blackwood
- Sofia Gubaidulina
- Lou Harrison
- Charles Ives
- Alvin Lucier
- Harry Partch
- Giacinto Scelsi
- James Tenney
See also:
External links:- Joe Monzo's Encyclopedia of Tuning
- Huygens-Fokker Foundation Centre for Microtonal Music
- BETWEEN U S: A HyperHistory of American Microtonalists
- Modes and Scales in Indian music
- John Starrett's Microtonal Music Page
- The American Festival of Microtonal Music
- The Centre for Microtonal Music, London
- Directory category: Microtonal tuning systems
- Interval, Journal of Music Research and Development
