|
Scores
Because there is no universal notation for overtone singing, many musicians and mentors have received numerous arrangements of symbols, numbers and odd looking scores, in an attempt to describe ways of relating to each other in small or large groups, while singing with overtones. Through this process many useful terms and symbols have come about that are used in our ensemble which appear on these scores. With these I hope to offer singers of all types a beautiful and thought-provoking approach to singing with overtones, to entice the many choirs and overtone singers in the global community to perform a piece of music from a score which focuses on vocal harmonics, to find functional terms, to provide notation of musical compositions for all levels of ability and, finally, to increase our capacity in service to the global overtone singing community. Below are some examples of tonal maps used in the improvisational etude Alignment. Tonal maps, based on a lattice of Just Intonation, are improvisation boundaries. A set of instructions is included in the full score. Many of the Symbols are derived from W.A. Mathieu's book Harmonic Experience published by Inner Traditions. Each intersecting point represents a tone. Each connection/line is a harmonic (whole number) ratio. Each direction represents both a kind and quality of musical proportion. A tonal map is essentially a visual metaphor depicting an untempered harmony of interconnected harmonics.
Singers use each map as a kind of play-field, and can learn, visually, where the harmonious,
dissonant or ambiguous harmonies are. Its a visual way to gain understanding about how
harmonics relate to harmony or just how harmony works. The advantage of this depiction is
that spacial reasoning is effective i.e. the number of connections or "how far" a tone is
from another, is musically relevant. Tones that are too far from one another on a tonal map
are ambiguous or "difficult to tune". Harmonies that are to far from center start to suggest
a new center. An excursion from center or "home", and a successful return to center
(ultimately without a drone) is the core study in Alignment. Section I: Over-tonal
Sections II and IV: Central
Section III: Reciprocal (Under-tonal)
Section V: Elemental
Section VI: Septimal
Section VII: Coda Here is a brief list of color/interval correspondences. Send an email for a nice copy of the complete score with instructions.
Red: a really sharp minor sixth discovered between the 13th and 8th harmonics. |
