This unit of measurement is relative and useful for comparison only. An octave has 1200 cents, and therefore in our 12-tone scale consisting of equally-spaced notes, each note is 100 cents apart. In music, the term cents is used to describe a difference in pitch. In order to understand the different possibilities for dividing the octave, we need to use some unit of measurement to talk about the differences in frequencies between different tones within an octave. But what if the most pure-sounding music has 19 notes, or 22? Or 51? A (Practically Infinite) Scale? In our modern world, all musical instruments and equipment are based around the 12-tone system. Some people even believe these compromises have done serious damage to music. However, in order to develop a universally-accepted tuning system, many compromises had to be made. In order to craft instruments that can be played together, it became necessary to have a universal system of tuning. But with the development of instruments that have rigidly “fixed” pitches, especially the piano (and the guitar), it became necessary to develop a system of determining what those pitches would be, exactly. Many early instruments, especially the human voice and unfretted string instruments such as violin, could produce any pitch within the octave. For this reason, even though human beings could potentially sing rich harmonies without special equipment, the concept was slow to develop, and in early music harmony was relatively simple. Hundreds of years ago, before we had tools that could measure musical pitch, there was not much of a basis for understanding how musical sounds work. Thus, microtonal music has a PR problem because its most accomplished practitioners are an advertisement for novelty, not for mainstream music. They tend to see a potential for creating unusual and cutting-edge sounds. Finally, the people most interested in creating microtonal music are generally not interested in making music more consonant. Using any other system makes you a pioneer. And while the 12-tone system is standard, systems using more than 12 notes are experimental and not as well understood. There are also relatively few musicians creating microtonal music. But audiences are now trained to hear and appreciate 12-tone music. Perhaps the reason is that the majority of instruments are designed for the 12-tone octave. However, the development of microtonal music, whose tones are smaller than the 12 pieces we normally use, has been slow. There is a small community of composers, performers and researchers involved in this area. And many tuning systems have been used or proposed beginning with the 12-tone system we use, spanning to systems which divide the octave into more than 50 notes. That’s how much this idea is taken for granted.īut there are many more than 12 potential pieces in the octave. In fact, many musicians don’t realize that this is a choice. One thing many musicians take for granted is the choice we make to divide the octave into 12 equal pieces. Next→ Deceptive Resolution: When Chords Misbehave Where Are There 12 Notes in an Octave?
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