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Notes & Letters column: A wonderworld of quarter-tones
https://www.fmq.fi/ ^ | Jan 1985 | Sampo Haapamäki

Posted on 08/10/2026 4:12:53 PM PDT by kawhill

"In diving into the world of microtones, I tried to make musicality my priority"

(Excerpt) Read more at fmq.fi ...


TOPICS: History; Music/Entertainment
KEYWORDS: harrypartch; musictruth; pitch; quartertones; sets
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1 posted on 08/10/2026 4:12:53 PM PDT by kawhill
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To: kawhill
Many composers nowadays are interested in microintervals. So, naturally, more instruments capable of producing them are being developed.

I've invented a trombone capable of hitting quarter-tone intervals. Next, I'm working on a violin that can do it.

2 posted on 08/10/2026 4:29:20 PM PDT by KarlInOhio (If the Islamic Republic government is in power in Iran when the war is over, we will have lost.)
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To: kawhill
Just my opinion.
We never recovered from the desecration of music during the last century.
You can expound on music theory but what I heard at the link is noise.
As I said, just my opinion.
3 posted on 08/10/2026 4:49:21 PM PDT by yesthatjallen
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To: kawhill

It sounds like what we used to call “White Noise”, or aural atmospheric sounds. Kind of a mix between sounds of my refrigerator in my first apartment

OR that Suspended Tension of a movie sequence, where you are looking for someone, you walk up into a quiet darkened attic, calling their name, the moment you fully enter their room, a bloody corpse on a braided hemp rope is somehow dropped from the rafters, and now swings to and fro in front of you, like a pendulum meant to hypnotize, the contorted face stares at you, unblinking eyes now glassed and bulging.


4 posted on 08/10/2026 5:34:11 PM PDT by lee martell
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To: kawhill

Quarter-tones are great. You just have to use 2 at a time.


5 posted on 08/10/2026 5:37:06 PM PDT by AloneInMass (You'd think there would be more similarity between "chain letter" and "chain mail".)
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