Microtonal songwriting breakdown with Brendan Byrnes

[@danielgiovannimusic7278]

It's so cool to see Brendan talking so openly about the 27 EDO to people who aren't into microtonal music. I just loved this channel.

[@BrendanByrnesMusic]

a fantastic channel for sure :)

[@MisterWondrous]

"Not For Everybody". Love it. Gonna name my next album that. Can't wait to be able to spend some headphone time with this episode. Found and followed him on Bandcamp and Soundcloud.

[@BrendanByrnesMusic]

thank you!

[@feliperestrepo4070]

Awesome deep dive into Brendan's writing and recording! Thank you!

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@TomasBatista89]

Man...! Thank you so much for this work, im discovering so much interesting and unique music over here!

[@mykola_iegorov]

Great thanks for continuing with Brendan!

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

It truly is my pleasure.

[@ChainsawCoffee]

Great interview, great music in a weird tuning! Microtonal "breaks the brain" just enough, and it becomes so exotic. Like it's a Gamelan tune, but not. I hope this is the future of pop music.

[@philjoseph6748]

Brendan has been my favourite musical artist since I discovered him and microtonal music about 4 years ago. He’s been a huge inspiration for my own music and microtonal exploration and it’s so cool to see his creative process and an excellent breakdown of 27EDO. I really encourage everyone to check out more of his work!

[@gfaris666]

so nice of you both to share this. thank you.

[@jazzbassoonpaul]

32:02 WOW. Amazing new dimensions!

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

So wild, right?

[@D5x610]

A while back I made a midi effect that makes it easier to work with different size tunings by mapping the input notes of a regular 12 note keyboard to whatever size tuning you choose. You can then play with the mapping of each of the 12 notes with the UI. It’s only for Max for Live currently, but I could see it being useful to have a VST midi effect that does something similar. kzbin.info/www/bejne/p4TdeXt9dq2aY8Usi=MUq94bumMWODRqy2

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

That's cool!

[@markfdesimone]

I am having so much fun watching the facial expressions in this video, not to mention the amazing deep dive into Brendan Byrnes' approach.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

Haha, I get that people are enjoying that, so I'm trying to include more of it

[@markfdesimone]

@@MakeWeirdMusic Well it taps into the 'reaction vid' phenomenon. But also, I think most people in Western culture have this visceral response to the unfamiliar notes and harmonies, so seeing the faces validates your audiences' feelings? I think it's fascinating that the reaction is so consistent. As you listen more to music in other tunings, I think your brain does settle in and open up to hear familiar shapes in the music.

[@alexposilkin9683]

I wasn’t aware of Brendan before the last video with him. But after watching it, I’ve been jamming the two EPs a lot. It sounds super exotic and alien and I’ve really been enjoying it. My wife and I heard some resemblance to the alt rock band Failure, which is not microtonal, but has something familiar to this music. Glad to have found Brendan’s music and looking to a deeper dive of the catalog.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

So glad you're enjoying it

[@GeoffreyEspin]

Thanks so much! An amazing aural experience. 👂👂

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

So glad you enjoyed it

[@manlypedro75]

Just awesome! thanks mate!

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

Glad you liked it!

[@pauljamison8546]

thanks for sharing some details of your method brendan. and thank you very much anthony for following up with a deeper dive into this fascinating artist/music. i was a 'this feels quite regular' comment on the previous interview - referring mainly to the accessibility of the songs. while i think the subtleties of frequencies are discernible they're presented in a way that is far from jarring. i recognize i'm just not familiar enough with the palette of tonal colours used to appreciate the style fully but it's definitely a great intro into this branch of music. for the songs i've listened to more and really enjoyed (halfway, blue skies, groundswell, sunlight, alive, everything) i like to think they'd be replicatable on 12 tone instruments, not for the sake of reducing or simplifying the songs but just cos they're great jams. have you tried performing/adapting your music on 'regular' tunings? if so what do i think of that sound, aka does a diatonic interpretation jar from your perspective? and do you compose 'regular' as well and then 27 edo-ify, or come at a song from the 27 edo mindset from the start? fascinating stuff.

[@danielgiovannimusic7278]

6:18 - There is an option called "subset" in microtonal music, it would be nothing more than selecting 12 notes from the system you want, 27 EDO as is the case here, and keeping these 27 notes where you will be able to play like a normal pianist on the MIDI controller, and if you want to turn on the other notes, just create banks where you will change at the touch of a button hehe, that's how I'm doing it in 31 EDO.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

That's interesting!!

[@volairelarp3773]

I got the Transfigured Earth I & II LP in, and on first spin it has become one of my new favorites. The packaging could've used some cardboard inserts though, the jacket was pretty dinged up on arrival. Gonna order 2227 next!

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

DO IT

[@BrendanByrnesMusic]

oh yikes, I'm sorry about that and I'm more than happy to send you a new copy of TE I/II. Just message me on BC. I usually put cardboard inserts in and I'll put some extra in next time. Thank you so much for the support!

[@volairelarp3773]

@@BrendanByrnesMusic no worries! That would be awesome. I'll contact you whenever I go to order 2227.

[@tricksunset2752]

Awesome video! A got a few my friends to check him out after the first interview. Not everyone liked his music, but a few did.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

Glad some of your friends enjoyed it!

[@epiphoney]

Just a 3 minute excerpt from the 6 hour Well-Tuned Piano, with minor 7ths that are 30 cents flat that somehow ring out better. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hqaoiH5mhNh5rLM There's a 12 minute sample on the band that is camp.

[@mfischer387]

Can you have Brendan Byrnes on your channel every week? *insert SpongeBob GIF* I NEED IT!

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

I'd be fine with that, too. I was texting him last night about how much I've enjoyed working with him.

[@epiphoney]

What is the intro song? Brendan needs a pricey Lumatone keyboard like Zheanna Erose. 5ths in 12 edo are close enough to me, unlike 3rds and 7ths. It’s rare to find people using JI chords except for Jon Catler. It’s easy to tune a guitar to an open just 7th chord. I think the 11th harmonic works better in higher voicings.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

Intro song: kzbin.info/www/bejne/r3q1dZ6VfLSFhc0 Thanks for the new microtonal artists!

[@Mister_Jahn]

Very cool, got into microtones when I decided to learn birdcalls and incorporate their "licks" on the guitar in the 80's (via does human speech so I thought, screw the humans)... way easier on viola though. Thing is people have to remember that microtones are all around us. They are commonplace, its just musical orthodoxy that makes them exotic.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

That's awesome. Have you seen the instagram account that notates bird calls?

[@Mister_Jahn]

@MakeWeirdMusic yeah, would have saved me time in the 80's... The trick is incorporating them in human music. So far so good.

[@christopherjobin-official7440]

So... when is the microtonal Fracture arrangment.

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

🤢

[@RPS3000]

Where can i find this instrument?

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

In the video he shows you how he does this with a standard MIDI controller and Pro Tools using Kontakt.

[@RPS3000]

@MakeWeirdMusic i was hoping to find the kontakt instrument somewhere

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

The Native Instruments website. It's a popular website.

[@RPS3000]

@@MakeWeirdMusic ah yes it was easier then i thought

[@Cr8Tron]

Nothing wrong with experimenting with things like this for the sake of it... But I really don't see (or hear) how the 27-TET system is ideal? The symmetrical versatility is two steps down from the 12-TET system; Instead of including four lower EDOs (i.e., 2-TET, 3-TET, 4-TET & 6-TET), it only includes 3-TET & 9-TET. Why not upgrade the versatility, rather than downgrade it (e.g., 72-TET, 36-TET, 24-TET, or even 60-TET)?

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

Don’t ask me! None of it makes sense 😂

[@markfdesimone]

I don't think Brendan is advocating 27EDO as the ideal tuning. I think its properties inspire him to make the music he wants to make. Consider 11EDO, as another example.. I really like playing melodies and bass lines in that tuning because their contours sound very familiar horizontally, and there aren't a million notes per octave to deal with. But what's really fun about 11EDO is how the melodic gestures get you to different destinations than you expect. Edit: my point is just that versatility isn't always the most inspiring aspect of a system. I bet highly divisible number would make versatile tuning systems mathmatically, but the large ones are pretty impractical, and I don't think a property like being divisible by 2, 3, 4 and 6 would come through in the music unless you were studying the score.

[@Cr8Tron]

@markfdesimone I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with some of what you're arguing. First of all, one of the examples I gave is actually less than the 27-TET, but, regardless, the other EDOs I gave as examples were not supposed to be impressive by how high their numbers are. Practicality-wise, I agree that larger ones might suffer in some ways; It just so happens that there isn't anything less than the 24-TET that would retain both the lower 3-TET and 4-TET systems (which have both proven to be quite useful just from the inadvertent use we've had of them via the standard 12-TET). As for properties of divisibility being able to "come through", I don't think I need to "study a score" to right away notice when a symmetrical scale is being used (diminished, whole-tone, etc.) But, giving you the benefit of the doubt, perhaps you're only regarding EDOs that are well beyond 12? Even if so, the truth is that the obviousness of the symmetries is proportional to how many notes you remove from in-between the notes marking the folds. For example, you obviously wouldn't play all the notes of a 60-TET system when trying to exploit the 5-TET system it inherits. Instead, you would want to select only certain notes of the 11 that are in-between each of the adjacent fold-marking notes, while making sure whatever pattern you choose is retained between each of the folds. This would be similar to when we play with diminished scales from our standard 12-TET system, where we play only the notes of some diminished 7th chord, along with some pattern of the two notes that are in-between each minor 3rd (in this case, either all being a half-step above each of the chordal notes, or below--but not both). The more types of symmetrical scales a system offers, the more options a composer has for modulating to various keys. Anyhow, the modularity of an equal temperament system is very important, and often overlooked (especially by just-intonation enthusiasts). The reason I say this, is that I rarely hear anyone ever discussing how apparent it is when just-intonation robs us of "melodiousness". I don't say this because of shortened/widened intervals that are less harmonious due to the Pythagorean comma, but rather because it is pretty obvious (from my experience) that EDOs not only provide a sense of melodic consistency during a chromatic run, but also from our brains' automatic ability to differentiate the the perceived pitch ratios (melodiousness), as opposed to actual frequency ratios (harmoniousness). In other words, we can *hear* that a whole-step is exactly twice the pitch interval of a half-step, or that a major 3rd is exactly twice the pitch interval of a whole-step, and that a 4th is exactly five times that of a half-step, etc. All in all, the logical approach for coming up with the "best" system to use for general purpose, would be based on the following criteria: 1. Melodic contour, which implies we need an EDO of some sort. 2. An EDO with a high enough resolution to achieve intervals that are close enough for our brains to *perceive* the harmonies that imply the essential just-intonation intervals. 3. An EDO that reinforces its own power though its inherited lower-resolution EDOs. When the above criteria is met, aural illusions can then be made to make more-remarkable sounding music, for perceptual paradoxes can now be discovered. I'm saying this because our brains already inherently recognize (without necessarily our cognitive awareness) that intervals borne out of the harmonic series should never be lining up with any intervals borne out of an EDO, but yet they seem to be in the context of the standard 12-TET music we now take for granted, which is the most impressive "magic trick" we've ever achieved in music (IMHO). As for the 11-TET system, I'm having difficulty imagining it working well in general. Any prime-number-based system is not a good one to use as a general rule of thumb. Furthermore, I can't help but ask whether the highly-imperfect fifth (2:2.91896, instead of 2:3) is going to convince the listener of there being a tonic? I have my doubts. If you wanna play around with it, I'm not discouraging you, as it might be cool in a certain artistic context for effect. But I wouldn't recommend dedicating an entire record's worth of material to it, which brings me to my final point: Regarding Brendan's intention, I don't follow you when you argue that he's not necessarily advocating the 27-TET system as being "ideal". When someone dedicates their energy to applying something to an entire record, that seems to be an avocation if you ask me.

[@markfdesimone]

I think 'ideal' is just subjective, and dependent upon the artist's goals. I really like exploring the different attributes each tuning offers. I really enjoy the fact that 11EDO has no discernible perfect fifth. Artistically, I can play melodies in 11EDO that sound familiar but distorted, and the disorienting feeling can be really fun. The fact that it's terrible for establishing a stable tonal center is exciting to me - it's something I want to play around with. You mentioned that prime number-based systems are not good ones to use. That includes 19, 31, 41 as well, but these systems have become quite popular in spite of their asymmetry. (22 EDO is kind of 11EDO in disguise, and that's also popular.) I think you mean prime numbers offer no symmetry and aren't divisible, right? Maybe it's because I'm a trombonist at heart, but I'm totally willing to say 'close enough' and take advantage of their strengths. I shouldn't be trying to speak for Brendan, but I agree with you in that committing to a certain tuning system is effectively advocating for its usefulness. I just don't think everyone is in search of an ideal. At least in my case, I'm more interested in whatever inspires me.

[@markfdesimone]

No wait, 22EDO is two 11EDOs sneaking around in a trench coat!

[@javastaker]

Hello, i'm being looking replicate this sound What is that instrument in Gladys Knight Songs. What is this technique called? It's like a cat meowing. kzbin.infoUgkxdMD6qNLj43va95hJV2j58_K5SuCumqqJ?si=5NzfZVNXAiIrmYbe kzbin.infoUgkxzyLR81Qt5yDBsgHjvMmhkiW-RcMPXKR_?si=ySgxRUhUMlHMoqJx kzbin.infoUgkxrviL7v4KjvAt8QwhQR3SidEXWYViIv4w?si=9Zr83t1TBJAFOiUo

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

LOL I have no idea

[@nicholasrella6904]

This guy got everyone calling the bassists from their high school bands to apologize. "Sorry bro. Turns out you weren't out of tune after all. You were playing microtonal and we just weren't on your level at the time."

[@MakeWeirdMusic]

LOL

[@BrendanByrnesMusic]

😅