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The words "microtone" and "microtonal" were coined before 1912 by Maud MacCarthy Mann in order to avoid the misnomer "quarter tone" when speaking of the srutis of Indian music. [2] Prior to this time the term "quarter tone" was used, confusingly, not only for an interval actually half the size of a semitone, but also for all intervals ...
Quarter tone on C. A quarter tone is a pitch halfway between the usual notes of a chromatic scale or an interval about half as wide (orally, or logarithmically) as a semitone, which itself is half a whole tone.
A microtone is a small interval, smaller than a semitone. Bach used semitones, but we don't call his music semitonal, or chromatic, or whatever. I compose extended JI, and the majority of intervals I use are significantly wider than a whole tone. Microtones crop up in the voice leading, but are not especially prevalent.
A specialized technique called "meend" involves pulling the main melody string down over the bottom portion of the sitar's curved frets, with which the sitarist can achieve a seven-semitone range of microtonal notes (however, because of the sitar's movable frets, sometimes a fret may be set to a microtone already, and no bending would be required).
The widespread use of the oud led to many variations on the instrument, including the saz, a Turkish long-necked lute that remains very popular in Turkey. [6] Another popular string instrument is the qanoun, developed by Farabi during the Abbasids era. Legend has it that Farabi played qanoun in court and alternately made people laugh, cry, or ...
12-tone equal temperament chromatic scale on C, one full octave ascending, notated only with sharps. Play ascending and descending ⓘ. 12 equal temperament (12-ET) [a] is the musical system that divides the octave into 12 parts, all of which are equally tempered (equally spaced) on a logarithmic scale, with a ratio equal to the 12th root of 2 (≈ 1.05946).
As described in the introduction, the Pythagorean comma may be derived in multiple ways: Difference between two enharmonically equivalent notes in a Pythagorean scale, such as C and B ♯, or D ♭ and C ♯ (see below).
A Carnatic concert. The shruti or śruti is the smallest interval of pitch that the human ear can detect and a singer or musical instrument can produce. [1] [2] The concept is found in ancient and medieval Sanskrit texts such as the Natya Shastra, the Dattilam, the Brihaddeshi, and the Sangita Ratnakara.