[linux-audio-dev] XAP: a polemic

David Olofson david at olofson.net
Mon Dec 16 22:07:00 UTC 2002


On Tuesday 17 December 2002 03.40, Paul Davis wrote:
[...]
> i've heard l.shankar, the phenomenal player of a double-necked
> electric violin (he's not bad on the traditional instrument as
> well) count indian talas in 3.5 beats and 9.5 beats. he counts:
>
>       1--2--3-1--2--3-1--2--3-1 ...
>
> and
>
>       1--2--3--4--5--6--7--8--9-1--2--3--4--5--6--7--8-9-1 ...
>
> perhaps any western musician would count
>
>       1-2-3-4-5-6-7-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-1 ...
>
> but he'd find it harder to collaborate with the people that
> actually play this kind of music as part of their own culture.

In fact, if you try just playing along with your sequencer, you'll 
quickly realize that just counting doesn't work. Try it!

(Hint: Input it step-time first, and play it. Listen to the wandering 
*relation* between the beats. Start easy with 2:3, 3:4 etc.)


> i've
> also heard and watched both zakir hussain and v. vikaryam count
> talas, and believe me, they don't do what you propose a musician
> would do.

I bet. Didn't take me much experimentation to realize it doesn't 
really have much to do with the counting at all.


> >2) the first time somebody uses 1/3 and 1/4 at the same time,
> >accumulating beat algorithms don't give the same result
> >reliably where they should.
>
> hmm. i'm not sure of this. i'm not entirely clear what you mean by
> these nomenclatures. do you mean "1 beat per measure,
> beat-note-value = a third note" and "1 beat per measure,
> beat-note-value = a quarter note"? or something else.

Isn't that just 3 notes + 4 notes in one bar?


//David Olofson - Programmer, Composer, Open Source Advocate

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