Temperamental Piano

Via Jonathan Bellman, here is a video on a new design of piano that allows the performer to adjust the tuning of each string with the use of sliders. Jonathan talks about the ability to change temperaments for his beloved Chopin. I can see possibilities in performing works by Gann, Young, and others who experiment with new scales. Or microtonal compositions. Or perhaps adding vibrato to a piano sound. I have some problems with the timbre of the piano itself, it sounds very tinny to me. It could be from the quality of the video, or the addition of the horizontal harp to the piano (see 2:20 of the video) which could vibrate sympathetically to strengthen the upper partials of the sounds. I'd like to hear the sliding system on a standard-sounding piano, one that doesn't attempt to sound like an Indian instrument. Here are some views about the hammer design that may have created this different sound.

The Fluid Piano will get its debut on Saturday at the University of Surrey, featuring composer/pianists Matthew Bourne, Nikki Yeoh and Pam Chowhan, and works by the inventor, Geoff Smith.

Lituus Envy

I am listening to the latest podcast of PRI's The World, which features music in the Geo Quiz. Apparently some crazy Scots have recreated a lituus and performed Bach with it! In reading up on this ancient Roman war-trumpet, I discovered that the Romans used different trumpets for different signals (according to Wikipedia):

The late Roman writer Vegetius briefly describes the use of trumpets in the Roman legions in his treatise De Re Militari:

“The legion also has its tubicines, cornicines and buccinatores. The tubicen sounds the charge and the retreat. The cornicines are used only to regulate the motions of the colours; the tubicines serve when the soldiers are ordered out to any work without the colours; but in time of action, the tubicines and cornicines sound together. The classicum, which is a particular signal of the buccinatores or cornicines, is appropriated to the commander-in-chief and is used in the presence of the general, or at the execution of a soldier, as a mark of its being done by his authority. The ordinary guards and outposts are always mounted and relieved by the sound of the tubicen, who also directs the motions of the soldiers on working parties and on field days. The cornicines sound whenever the colours are to be struck or planted. These rules must be punctually observed in all exercises and reviews so that the soldiers may be ready to obey them in action without hesitation according to the general’s orders either to charge or halt, to pursue the enemy or to retire. For reason will convince us that what is necessary to be performed in the heat of action should constantly be practised in the leisure of peace.”^[13] (De Re Militari, Book II.)

Like the Greek salpinx the Roman trumpets were not regarded as musical instruments. Among the tems used to describe the tuba’s tone, for instance, were horribilis (“horrible”), terribilis (“terrible”), raucus (“raucous”), rudis (“coarse”), strepens (“noisy”) and stridulus (“shrieking”). When sounding their instruments, the tubicines sometimes girded their cheeks with the capistrum (“muzzle”) which aulos (“flute”) players used to prevent their cheeks from being puffed out unduly.

This is the type of signal music Daniel meant in his comment to Saturday's post. However, while these trumpets were not intended to produce music themselves during Roman times, they were both reappropriated for musical use by Bach's time, and of course were the inspiration for those crazy trumpet parts in Respighi's Pines of Rome. Here is a video that includes pictures and audio of the litui used in Bach's "O Jesu Christ, meins lebens licht":

What's the opposite of a fat lady singing?

That's right, it is a high school boy singing a falsetto tone loud and long enough to break a wine glass:

I'd been planning on getting back to blogging, and when I saw this on my Science Friday podcasts, I knew I had an opening post. I taught a Music Acoustics class for Winter Term back in 2004, and one of the student projects was on singers breaking wine glasses. The two students accurately described the controversy of this subject, mentioned in the video above. All I can say is, this is another reason why high school students shouldn't drink wine!

I had a very busy spring semester, both personally and professionally, thus blogging fell by the wayside. But I have some reviews to write, jokes to make, and opinions to espouse, and now have the time to do so. Plus I might start posting dachshund photos.

Musical Architecture

An article in the latest Journal of the Acoustical Society of America made me aware of this rather cool thing. Vitthala Temple, located in Hampi, India, has 56 pillars designed to sound specific pitches when tapped. Here is a video demonstrating them:

These musical pillars are also called the SaReGaMa pillars. Sa Re Ga Ma are Classical Indian solfege syllables, used for learning the ragas. I can imagine using the whole temple to accompany great musical rituals.

Anish Kumar, T. Jayakumar, C. Babu Rao, Govind K. Sharma, K. V. Rajkumar, Baldev Raj, and P. Arundhati. (2008) "Nondestructive characterization of musical pillars of Mahamandapam of Vitthala Temple at Hampi, India" Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 124/2, pp. 911-917.

What's out there

A colleague in the math department sent me this link to a great explanation of violin acoustics.

Stephen Casales has finished the Unfinished Symphony.

Composer, teacher and critic Stephen Casale studied theory and composition at the New England Conservatory of Music and musicology at New York University. The project to realize a performing version of the Scherzo movement of Schubert's "Unfinished" symphony based on Schubert's piano sketch for the movement took shape in Martin Chusid's graduate course on Schubert at NYU, where it was performed in 1978. A studio recording of the Scherzo was subsequently made by the Czech Radio Symphony under Vladimir Valek in 1995. The present performance by the Toronto Philharmonia is the first professional concert presentation of this realization of the movement.

A new e-company is trying to connect music instructors with students at ClickForLessons. I have no idea how effective it is.

This Saturday there is a symposium celebrating John Cage's 95th birthday at the University of New Hampshire.

John Cage in 2007: Reception, Performance Practice, Analysis

Symposium, 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m., M-223, Paul Creative Arts Center, UNH

Our Memory of What Happened is Not What Happened: Cage and the Power of Myth
Brent Reidy, Ph.D. candidate, Musicology, Indiana University

On John Cage's Late Music, Analysis, and the Model of Renga in Two2
Rob Haskins, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Music, UNH

Interdeterminacy and Performance Practice in Cage?s _Variations_
David P. Miller, Boston, MA

Thinking About Cage and Nature, Back Then and Right Now
David Andrew, Ph.D., Professor of Art History, UNH

Concert, 8:00 p.m., Bratton Recital Hall, Paul Creative Arts Center, UNH

Music for One
Margaret Herlehy, Oboe

Four6
Rob Haskins, David Miller, Laurel Karlik Sheehan, and Brent Reidy, performers

Two2
Rob Haskins and Laurel Karlik Sheehan, pianos

Disrupting unruly fans

Sander J. van Wijngaarden and Johan A. van Balken (2007), "Theoretical feasibility of suppressing offensive sports chants by means of delayed feedback of sound," Journal of the Acoustic Society of America, 122/1, 436-445.

A novel approach for disrupting offensive chants at sporting events is proposed, based on attacking synchronization between individuals. Since timing is crucial for coordination between chanters, disruption of timing is expected to be effective against undesired chants. Delayed auditory feedback is known to disrupt timing in individual sound production. It may be expected to have similar effects on groups of chanters. To test this hypothesis, a controlled laboratory study was carried out. This showed that the timing of individuals joining in with sports chants can indeed be severely disrupted by also presenting an artificially delayed version of this chant (distracter). This effect is reduced as an individual is given more cues (direction, fidelity) to differentiate between original chant and distracter. However, informal field trials showed that it may be hard to exploit the perceptual effects discussed here for countering offending sports chants in a real-life setting, particularly due to feedback distortion at the required high levels. ©2007 Acoustical Society of America

Perhaps this technique could also be used to prevent clapping between movements.