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New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Sun Apr 14, 2019 10:30 pm
by fatraccoons
https://youtu.be/Y0BP8ji0B5k

Still limited to just using one instrument, but I've added some drums and samples. I was talking a while back about how much I like Arabic music, and it was really cool to discover Iranian/Persian classical music and I even found a paper talking about the scales. Let me know what you think!

Based on the work of Safi al-Din: http://www.muslimheritage.com/uploads/T ... _Music.pdf

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Thu Apr 18, 2019 10:18 pm
by Rakso
I really like it, it's relaxing and sounds a bit "mysterious". The drums also suit the song. I think you've nailed the feel of Persian music.

However, lets try to fix that one instrument thing. For me exporting tracks with Zynaddsubfx with microtonal data works no problemo. I have Linux Mint Mate 19.1 (newly installed) as well as LMMS 1.2.0-rc8 appimage. What system are you using?

I just create the Scala files, open them in Zynaddsubfx and the pitches are readjusted in the LMMS piano roll (and also when exporting). I don't need to use Carla or anything.

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Sat Apr 20, 2019 3:35 pm
by fatraccoons
Rakso wrote:
Thu Apr 18, 2019 10:18 pm
I really like it, it's relaxing and sounds a bit "mysterious". The drums also suit the song. I think you've nailed the feel of Persian music.

However, lets try to fix that one instrument thing. For me exporting tracks with Zynaddsubfx with microtonal data works no problemo. I have Linux Mint Mate 19.1 (newly installed) as well as LMMS 1.2.0-rc8 appimage. What system are you using?

I just create the Scala files, open them in Zynaddsubfx and the pitches are readjusted in the LMMS piano roll (and also when exporting). I don't need to use Carla or anything.
I've been writing out the scales by hand, I think lmms has trouble processing/extrapolating the scale without having a scala file to load and that's why it's been detuning when I export it. It works fine when I use scala files even for multiple instruments. Thank you.

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Sat Apr 20, 2019 4:38 pm
by 18musicians
Nice work. I like the flavor added by the microtonal inflections - I'm no expert on Persian music but there is certainly an exotic middle-east feel going on here. Keep it up!

If you're interested, here's a bunch of approaches to middle easter / maqam scales, some traditional and some maybe a bit more experimental interpretations:
https://en.xen.wiki/w/Arabic,_Turkish,_Persian

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Sun Apr 21, 2019 2:39 pm
by Rakso
fatraccoons wrote:
Sat Apr 20, 2019 3:35 pm
Rakso wrote:
Thu Apr 18, 2019 10:18 pm
I really like it, it's relaxing and sounds a bit "mysterious". The drums also suit the song. I think you've nailed the feel of Persian music.

However, lets try to fix that one instrument thing. For me exporting tracks with Zynaddsubfx with microtonal data works no problemo. I have Linux Mint Mate 19.1 (newly installed) as well as LMMS 1.2.0-rc8 appimage. What system are you using?

I just create the Scala files, open them in Zynaddsubfx and the pitches are readjusted in the LMMS piano roll (and also when exporting). I don't need to use Carla or anything.
I've been writing out the scales by hand, I think lmms has trouble processing/extrapolating the scale without having a scala file to load and that's why it's been detuning when I export it. It works fine when I use scala files even for multiple instruments. Thank you.
Ok! It's actually pretty easy to make a Scala file. If you have been writing scales by hand, you just need to add a title to the first line and number of notes to the second line, and save your text as a .scl file.

Here are the scala file specifications: http://huygens-fokker.org/scala/scl_format.html

I actually have a very simple Python script that I use to generate the text that I can save as a scl file (it generates text after I input number of notes and interval to divide). I can share it with you if you feel like you need it.

Of course, the best way is probably to download the Scala software but I had trouble installing it on Linux.

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Sun Apr 21, 2019 11:23 pm
by 18musicians
You should try out Sevish's "Scale Workshop" site. It's another good alternative for creating .scl files, and you don't need to install anything. It also has a web synth to try out scales on the qwerty keyboard.
http://sevish.com/scaleworkshop/

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Fri Apr 26, 2019 8:38 pm
by fatraccoons
Rakso wrote:
Sun Apr 21, 2019 2:39 pm
fatraccoons wrote:
Sat Apr 20, 2019 3:35 pm
Rakso wrote:
Thu Apr 18, 2019 10:18 pm
I really like it, it's relaxing and sounds a bit "mysterious". The drums also suit the song. I think you've nailed the feel of Persian music.

However, lets try to fix that one instrument thing. For me exporting tracks with Zynaddsubfx with microtonal data works no problemo. I have Linux Mint Mate 19.1 (newly installed) as well as LMMS 1.2.0-rc8 appimage. What system are you using?

I just create the Scala files, open them in Zynaddsubfx and the pitches are readjusted in the LMMS piano roll (and also when exporting). I don't need to use Carla or anything.
I've been writing out the scales by hand, I think lmms has trouble processing/extrapolating the scale without having a scala file to load and that's why it's been detuning when I export it. It works fine when I use scala files even for multiple instruments. Thank you.
Ok! It's actually pretty easy to make a Scala file. If you have been writing scales by hand, you just need to add a title to the first line and number of notes to the second line, and save your text as a .scl file.

Here are the scala file specifications: http://huygens-fokker.org/scala/scl_format.html

I actually have a very simple Python script that I use to generate the text that I can save as a scl file (it generates text after I input number of notes and interval to divide). I can share it with you if you feel like you need it.

Of course, the best way is probably to download the Scala software but I had trouble installing it on Linux.
Thank you so much guys! I would like to see that python script, it hasn't been able to read the .scl files I make in Sublime.

Re: New Persian Scale Microtonal Piece

Posted: Thu May 02, 2019 12:28 pm
by Rakso
fatraccoons wrote:
Fri Apr 26, 2019 8:38 pm
Rakso wrote:
Sun Apr 21, 2019 2:39 pm
fatraccoons wrote:
Sat Apr 20, 2019 3:35 pm


I've been writing out the scales by hand, I think lmms has trouble processing/extrapolating the scale without having a scala file to load and that's why it's been detuning when I export it. It works fine when I use scala files even for multiple instruments. Thank you.
Ok! It's actually pretty easy to make a Scala file. If you have been writing scales by hand, you just need to add a title to the first line and number of notes to the second line, and save your text as a .scl file.

Here are the scala file specifications: http://huygens-fokker.org/scala/scl_format.html

I actually have a very simple Python script that I use to generate the text that I can save as a scl file (it generates text after I input number of notes and interval to divide). I can share it with you if you feel like you need it.

Of course, the best way is probably to download the Scala software but I had trouble installing it on Linux.
Thank you so much guys! I would like to see that python script, it hasn't been able to read the .scl files I make in Sublime.
As 18musicians rightly pointed out (which I forgot about) Sevish released the awesome Scale workshop website which has great functionality. Sevish has a tutorial about it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hginh_dGJLU

Incase you need my python script anyway (works for equal division tunings), I'll paste it below (to use it run the code in a Pyhton interpreter and then copy paste the text output to a text editor and save the text file in .scl format. You can then locate and load the file from Zynaddsubfx). However, I don't see much reason to use it considering that the Scale workshop exists.

Code: Select all

#Scale files equal division
number_of_notes = 19
interval_to_divide = 1200 #in cents
custom_title = "" #leave empty quotation marks for automatic title

def print_title():
    if custom_title=="":
        if interval_to_divide==1200:
            print(str(number_of_notes)+" EDO")
        else:
            print(str(number_of_notes)+" note equal division of "+str(interval_to_divide)+" cents")
    else: print custom_title

def print_notes():
    for i in range (number_of_notes):
        print ((interval_to_divide*1.0)/number_of_notes)*(i+1)
   
print_title()
print number_of_notes
print_notes()