Thick Relationality: Microtonality and the Technique of Intonation in 21St Century String Performance

University of Huddersfield Repository Benjamin, Mira Thick Relationality: Microtonality and the Technique of Intonation in 21st Century String Performance Original Citation Benjamin, Mira (2019) Thick Relationality: Microtonality and the Technique of Intonation in 21st Century String Performance. Doctoral thesis, University of Huddersfield. This version is available at http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/id/eprint/35116/ The University Repository is a digital collection of the research output of the University, available on Open Access. Copyright and Moral Rights for the items on this site are retained by the individual author and/or other copyright owners. 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For more information, including our policy and submission procedure, please contact the Repository Team at: [email protected]. http://eprints.hud.ac.uk/ University of Huddersfield School of Music, Humanities and Media Department of Music Thick Relationality Microtonality and the Technique of Intonation in 21st Century String Performance Mira Benjamin Submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Music, January 2019. 2 Copyright Statement • The author of this thesis (including any appendices and/ or schedules to this thesis) owns any copyright in it (the “Copyright”) and s/he has given The University of Huddersfield the right to use such Copyright for any administrative, promotional, educational and/or teaching purposes. • Copies of this thesis, either in full or in extracts, may be made only in accordance with the regulations of the University Library. Details of these regulations may be obtained from the Librarian. Details of these regulations may be obtained from the Librarian. This page must form part of any such copies made. • The ownership of any patents, designs, trademarks and any and all other intellectual property rights except for the Copyright (the “Intellectual Property Rights”) and any reproductions of copyright works, for example graphs and tables (“Reproductions”), which may be described in this thesis, may not be owned by the author and may be owned by third parties. Such Intellectual Property Rights and Reproductions cannot and must not be made available for use without permission of the owner(s) of the relevant Intellectual Property Rights and/or Reproductions. 3 4 Table of Contents List of Figures 8 Abstract 11 Acknowledgements 12 Introduction 15 Objectives, Methodologies & Chapter Structure 16 Experimental Music and the Repertoire Elephant 18 A note on the trajectory of this research 19 Part 1. Five Chameleons 1. Intonation, Microtonality, Technique, Practice 25 1.1 Intonation; Technique 25 1.2 Microtonality; Practice 34 2. Practice Research 43 Artistic (Practice as) Research 43 ‘Performer’s Analysis’ 45 Repetition, Experimentation and ‘Epistemic Things’ 51 Part 2. Ways of Knowing 3. Modelling Pitch Space 57 3.1 Open-chain Tuning Systems 57 Pythagorean Intonation 62 Just Intonation 65 3.2 Closed-chain Tuning Systems 69 4. Paradigms of String Intonation Technique 73 4.1 The Projected Fret 76 4.2 Relational Intonation 84 Simultaneous/Successive Intonation 91 4.3 Intuitive Intonation 98 4.4 Connecting Threads 105 4.5 Components of an Embodied Paradigm of Intonation 109 Listening 111 Aural Imagination 114 5 5. (an)Notation 119 Potential categories of pitch notation 121 ‘How they are directed’ 129 Annotation and ‘the medium of the notebook’ 132 Part 3. Instances of Practice 6. Audio Recordings, Annotated Scores and Commentaries 135 Patterns of Intonation Technique 135 Where each study piece within the project 137 6.1 Martin Arnold: Slip Minuet 138 What isn’t in the score 139 Difference Tones and Repeatability 140 Messiness and Presence 143 What I carry forward 145 6.2 Chiyoko Szlavnics: Freehand Poitras 146 Harmonic Identities 146 Regions of Tolerance 148 Repetition 150 What I carry forward 151 6.3 Howard Skempton: Tendrils 152 A Fundamental Asymmetry 152 Intonation Drift 155 Predictive Strategies 157 Reflecting on prior practice 160 What I carry forward 160 6.4 James Weeks: Windfell 161 Bodily Sounds 161 Holding and Matching 163 ‘Placed in a world’ (What I carry forward) 164 6.5 John Cage: Four 168 Time Brackets 168 Surface Consonance and Potential Harmony 169 Preference Rules 172 Perceived References 172 Reflecting on prior practice 177 What I carry forward 178 6 6.6 Scott Mc Laughlin: The endless mobility of listening 180 ‘Drone Bowing’ 180 (re)Tuning 181 Seeking and Capturing 182 Contingency and Material Agency 184 Is this intonation technique? (What I carry forward) 186 7. Teaching ‘Advanced Intonation for Strings’ 187 7.1 Methods 187 7.2 Materials 189 7.3 Weekly Lesson Plan 191 Week 1: The Glissando Continuum 191 Week 2: The Harmonic Series 192 Week 3: Tuning Systems 194 Week 4: Cents and Ratios 196 Week 5: Playing with Low-Order Intervals 197 Week 6: Making Decisions 198 Week 7: Listening Outward/Listening Inward 199 Weeks 8-10: Rehearsals 200 7.4 Reflections on this Teaching Practice 200 Addressing Preconceptions 201 Active Listening 202 Harmonics 203 Hearing Proportions 204 Reading Notation, Making Decisions 205 ‘Something completely new’ (What I carry forward) 207 8. Why I’m once again ready to listen to more than intonation... (What I carry forward) 209 References 215 Appendices Appendix A 225 Appendix B 226 Appendix C 237 Appendix D 238 7 List of Figures 0.1 Initial Leeds Concept Map 21 0.2 Modified Leeds Concept Map 22 0.3 Final Leeds Concept Map: Relationality 23 1.1.1 Audiation leads to actualisation 31 1.1.2 A cycle of embodied technique 31 1.1.3 Practice as the instantiation of technique 32 1.1.4 A cycle of embodied technique in the practice of an instrument 33 1.2.1 Major sixth 37 1.2.2 A Major sixth at variable pitch heights 37 1.2.3 The reflective component of intonation technique 40 3.1.1 Intervals that appear in the first nine partials of a harmonic series on A… 59 3.1.2 Four different ‘Major thirds’, their ratios and cent deviations 59 3.1.3 Two versions of F on the violin D-string… 60 3.1.4 Tenney’s 2-dimensional 2,3 (3-limit) pane of harmonic space 62 3.1.5 Pythagorean circle of fifths with cents, starting on A(+/- 0) 63 3.1.6 Pythagorean spiral of fifths on A 63 3.1.7 Barbieri’s two-size semitone… 64 3.1.8 Campagnoli’s enharmonic fingering chart 64 3.1.9 Tenney’s 5-limit 3-dimensional harmonic space 65 3.1.10 Tenney’s 5-limit, 2-dimensional pitch class projection plane 66 3.1.11 Tenney’s ‘primary harmonic relations within the diatonic scales’ 66 3.1.12 Tenney’s ‘primary harmonic relations within the chromatic scale’ 67 3.1.13 ‘Play the open D-string together with B-natural…’ 68 3.2.1 Relative Locations of pitches in PI, JI and 12-EDO scales 70 4.1.1 Geminiani’s violin fingerboard schematic ‘A’ 77 4.1.2 Section of Campagnoli’s fingerboard diagram, as published in Metodo… 78 4.1.3 Isidore Berger’s violin fingerboard 80 4.1.4 Maia Bang’s fingerboard chart 82 4.1.5 Linear intentionality characterises The Projected Fret Paradigm 83 4.2.1 A type-set reproduction of Baillot’s illustration… 86 4.2.2 Joachim’s diatonic scale measured in Hertz and corresponding Just ratios 87 4.2.3 Joachim’s Consonant and Dissonant intervals… 87 4.2.4 ‘Normal’ and ‘Tempered’ finger positions 89 4.2.5 JI annotation of chromatic pitches on the violin D-string… 89 4.2.6 Sevcik: ‘the semitone (b-c) must be stopped slightly different in each bar… 90 4.2.7 JI annotation of Sevcik’s schematic for semitone tuning 90 4.2.8 Sassmanshaus’ suggested intonation… 92 4.2.9 Heman’s Harmonic Series chord construction… 93 4.2.10 Heman’s Pythagorean scale construction… 93 4.2.11 Heman’s annotation of intonation in a violin study by Kreutzer 94 4.2.12 Kimber’s graphic illustration of Melodic vs Harmonic Intonation 95 4.3.1 An example of the tuning strategy described by Schwebel… 103 4.4.1 Qualitative adjectives describing ‘in tune’ and ‘out of tune’ 108 4.5.1 Listening as a means of discerning accuracy 111 4.5.2 Reflection as a component of embodied technique 116 8 5.1 Christopher Fox’s Chambre Privée for string quartet… 121 5.2 James Tenney’s Koan for String Quartet… 122 5.3 Taylor Brook’s Ptolemy’s Observation… 122 5.4 Tenney’s Arbor Vitae (2006) 123 5.5 Taylor Brook’s quarter, sixth, and twelfth-tone accidental nomenclature 124 5.6 Quarter-tone nomenclature from Scelsi’s Fifth String Quartet 124 5.7 Selection from Sabat & Schweinitz’s HEJI Pirch Notation… 125 5.8 Richard Glover’s Seventh Inversions 126 5.9 Tenney’s Koan 126 5.10 Sabat’s Cucumber Serenades 127 5.11 Scordatura (transposing) line (bottom) and sounding line (top)… 128 5.12 André Cormier’s Petit Quatuor, Violin 1 128 5.13 Four descriptions of a Major 3rd 129 5.14 Instrumental variables influence the sounding of notated pitches 131 6.0.1 Where each piece sits within the project 137 6.1.1 Martin Arnold, Slip Minuet, mm.

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