Top all-time · #7527
Kyle Gann
Personal blog · kylegann.comculturewriting
Kyle Gann's personal blog at kylegann.com covers culture and writing. Since 2009, 11 different Hacker News readers have linked it 15 times, most often “An Introduction to Historical Musical Tunings”. No feed was found, so read it on the site itself.
Too few sampled comments (9) to say how often HN recommends it.?
Why HN links it
HN readers link Kyle Gann's site and his book The Arithmetic of Listening for microtonality, just intonation and tuning systems, plus his music recordings and pages on tuning history.
Summarised by Claude from a sample of 9 HN comments that link here. Each comment is marked recommending, critical or neutral (citing without judging); how this works.
Most-linked posts?
- /Gannbooks.html2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2022-11-17
- An Introduction to Historical Musical Tunings2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2019-10-16
What Hacker News says?
Along the same lines, but perhaps more accessible, and played with a Yamaha Disklavier player piano: http://www.kylegann.com/BudRanBackOut.mp3 Kyle Gann - Bud Ran Back Out (Mechanical Piano Study No. 6) (2001) "The question was whether I could make the Disklavier respond as fast as Bud Powell played. Doubting that I could surpass him, I added some tricks that I hope Powell might have envied, such as playing his ultr…
Comment linking /DisklavierStudiesnotes.html
on “The Impossible Music of Black MIDI”Submitted A Forest from the Seeds of Minimalism:An Essay on Postminimal and Totalist Music as a story · 1 points
HN discussionI'm not so sure. An audience feels the music much more intensely if the artist is feeling it. If the artist merely performs it, the audience doesn't feel it nearly as much. Great radio lab episode! re: hearing something awful becomes pleasant with repetition The first time I heard this (composed using non-chromatic scale with 16 pitches to the octave) was somewhat uncomfortable, but after hearing it a few times, it…
Comment linking /Fractured.html
on “Music Generates Feelings That Are Only Weakly Bound to the Music”Submitted An Introduction to Historical Musical Tunings as a story · 1 points
HN discussionThe best current resource is the Kyle Gann book, "The Arithmetic of Listening". It's fantastic, by a world authority on the topic. https://www.kylegann.com/Gannbooks.html Also for anyone interested in just intonation based microtonality, I did a video demo of a tool I made using my open source Scheme for Max extension to Max here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L7edwef-5k&t=2s&ab_channel=...
Comment linking /Gannbooks.html
on “Resources for microtonal music”Submitted La Monte Young's the Well-Tuned Piano (1993) [pdf] as a story · 1 points
HN discussionIts also interesting the history of musical notes, who decided which frequency is which note. Its amazing to think a few hundred years ago people didn't all use the same A->G notes. Also other cultures never adopted the modern temperament. https://www.kylegann.com/histune.html
Comment linking /histune.html
on “Perception of musical pitch varies across cultures”I really like this site for info on various tunings, including Just Intonation, where the intervals ARE perfect mathematical ratios: https://www.kylegann.com/microtonality.html One tidbit I always think about: > I've had interesting experiences playing just-intonation music for non-music-major students. Sometimes they will identify an equal-tempered chord as "happy, upbeat," and the same chord in just intonation as…
Comment linking /microtonality.html
on “We do not prefer chords to be perfectly in mathematical ratios: study”Kyle Gann addresses this topic on his web site https://www.kylegann.com/A432.html
Comment linking /A432.html
on “Music Tuned to 440 Hz versus 432 Hz and the Health Effects”Not directly related but Bob Brozman has some interesting thoughts on music - "African-based music normally has as the fundamental meter: both 2 and 3 at the same time. This opens the door to syncopation, polyrhythms and musical creativity, which occurs on a more primal level in the brain than harmony. It is acknowledged that Europeans developed harmony further than any other culture; but rhythmically their culture…
Comment linking /microtonality.html
on “High SAT = Beethoven; Low SAT = Lil Wayne”It may simply be in a different temperament or just/pure intonation rather than out of tune. I'm rather curious if anyone can work it out. http://www.kylegann.com/microtonality.html http://music.cwru.edu/duffin/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_temperament
Comment linking /microtonality.html
on “Prehistoric flute in Germany is oldest known”Kyle Gann's Arithmetic of Listening goes deeply into this. Given an infinite number of ways of dividing the range from f to 2f , some other equal-division temperaments (31 or 53, for example) get closer than 12TET to maintaining low-integer ratios across key centers, but each additional pitch adds complexity. I'd recommend that book in particular. https://www.kylegann.com/Gannbooks.html
Comment linking /Gannbooks.html
on “Why can't you tune your guitar?”