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Scott William Perry, MIDI Sequencing - Rhythmicon Pulses, for Virtual Pierrot Ensemble in 13​-​Limit Just Intonation

from Acoustic Works Realized on Virtual Instruments by Scott William Perry

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Rhythmicon Pulses, for Virtual Pierrot Ensemble
in 13-Limit Just Intonation
Music by
Scott William Perry

I have had a fascination with complex rhythm from the start of my education as a composer. Something in my nervous system seems to be inclined to tapping polyrhythms. I was relieved when I found out about Henry Cowell and his book, New Musical Resources. Not only did I feel less alone in my rhythmic strangeness by reading his book, I also found in it a way of connecting rhythm with my other fascination, natural harmony. Cowell did not do much to suggest Xenharmonic thinking but there was enough of suggested path forward that I could begin to integrate rhythm and Just Intonation.

While I'm not even close to being the first person to explore this connection, I do have my own ear and way of dealing with the materials of it. One of my first set pieces along these lines, Three Pieces for Oboe and Nine Strings (scottwilliamperry.bandcamp.com/track/three-pieces-for-oboe-and-nine-strings ), makes use of what I call, harmonically adjacent polyrhythm. So, in the third piece of the set, there is a prominent 3/2 harmony. However, instead of setting that harmony directly with the 3:2 polyrhythm, I used a 6:5 polyrhythm to create a meta-harmony between the pitches and the rhythm.

For a long while I approximated the ratios of the Harmonic Series to the nearest equal-tempered quarter-tone. This was a concession to the practicality of performing my already very difficult music. I have since given up this concession. It didn't pay off. Performers marred my music in almost any case. So, now we live in an age where virtual instruments are quite close to sounding like real instruments. Since this is the case and computers are almost too accurate in sequenced performance, I am pretty much ready to make the jump to composing exclusively for virtual instruments since I can make whatever music that strikes my Rhythmic/Harmonic imagination without worrying about rehearsal time and the sickening politics of the world of new music performance.

Rhythmicon Pulses makes use of the totalistic devices mentioned above in a thoroughgoing way. The 13-Limit Scale is simply the first seven odd partials of the harmonic series arranged into one octave; 1/1, 9/8, 5/4, 11/8, 3/2, 13/8, 7/4, 2/1. The rhythms are all derived from the harmonic relationships but are not necessarily directly correlated with the fractions in harmonic play.

It is also worth mentioning that while I love all this theory and the philosophical implications of it, music theory is a secondary concern to the musical experience. As far as that is concerned, I'm open to almost any interpretation you might have of the music. In fact while the music might mean something specifically poetic to me, I would like the music I compose to have a life beyond my own imagination. Maybe you will enjoy it or find something worthwhile in it. I certainly hope you will.

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from Acoustic Works Realized on Virtual Instruments, released March 6, 2020

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Scott William Perry Ojai, California

Scott Perry earned his PhD in music composition from UCSB in 2019. He holds a BA from UCSB (CCS), a MFA from California Institute of the Arts and a MA from UC Davis. His teachers include Beverly Grigsby, Jeremy Haladyna, Kurt Rohde, Wolfgang von Schweinitz, Ulrich Krieger, Pablo Ortiz, Mika Pelo, David Rosenboom, Curtis Roads and Clarence Barlow. ... more

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