tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Thu Feb 03 07:13:09 2000
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Re: Klingon Music
- From: "Qermaq" <[email protected]>
- Subject: Re: Klingon Music
- Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2000 10:09:07 -0500
Yep, still here...
Noted the conversation on Klingon music and thought I'd put forth the
thoughts that had come up when charghwI', SuStel, I, and others discussed
this some time ago.
An "octave", the doubling of frequency, is so called because the number of
tones we divide it into, including the top and bottom, is eight. A "nonave"
has no definition, but we assume it is an interval of some size which is
divided into nine tones, including top and bottom. Examples of Terran
nine-tone scales include the diminished scale, with alternating half steps
and whole steps.
charghwI' proposed that a Klingon nonave might be a tripling of frequency.
This seems to be workable and actually sounds pretty good, but is NOT canon
at all. I proposed that, in this system, we could find a scale similar to
our pentatonic - A C D E G A B D E. If we were to "equally temper" the
twelfth (our name for the "nonave" as proposed) into such a scale, we get
intervals of 237.75 cents, or a bit more than a quarter tone flat to a minor
third. We could also alternate intervals of 285.3 cents and 190.2 (the
ratio of ratios is 3:2) and get a really close approximation of the scale I
spelled out above.
Of course, it is possible that the nonave is something else, and perhaps
this is all misinformation from a Maltz who slept through musical acoustics,
but these are some of the ideas that have come forth. Ultimately, however,
no nonavic system has been found where the bits of existing Klingon music
are explained, so it may be that only folk songs and such are written in the
nonavic system, and newer works borrow from twelve-tone tunings and other
inter-planetary musical languages.
not maSovlaH. Do'Ha'.
Qermaq