Links

Maps

The Xenharmonic Alliance – Google My Maps

A worldwide map of microtonalists. Please add yourself!

Useful tools

List of music software -- A xenwiki page about useful web apps and software.

Making Microtonal Music is Easier Than You’d Think

Extensive overview. Mainly for beginners, but even experienced xenners will likely find something useful here.

Ear training websites

http://www.chord-book.com/ear_training/main.html

(page without title) Harry Partch's 43-tone JI scale, plus 19, 22, 24, 31 and 53 edo, plus a Bohlen-Pierce scale

The Just Intonation Ear Trainer

Just intonation only

Tall Kite's EarTrainer41

EarTrainer41 is an ear trainer for 41edo, as well as a notation guide and an ambient music generator!

Discord server

Xenharmonic Alliance Discord server (invite link)

Facebook groups

IF YOU'RE NEW TO FACEBOOK: If you're joining facebook just to interact with the microtonal community, be aware that every facebook group gets bombarded with spammer accounts. These are bare-bones profiles with few friends and little activity, asking to join the group. If allowed to join, these accounts usually post spam about cheap sunglasses, how to make $500 a day working from home, etc. As a result, the admins of all these facebook groups have learned to only admit active profiles. So if you have been avoiding facebook for years, how do you make a profile that doesn't look like you're a spammer? In your "about" section, say something thoughtful and intelligent about microtonality, alternative tunings, music theory, instruments you play, bands you're in, pieces you've composed, or whatever... anything to let us know you're a real person!

Featured

The Xenharmonic Alliance II

(the most active group and a good one for beginners) "For musicians and enthusiasts of music of the microtonal variety - for the notes between the cracks of the piano - for the Emancipation of Pitch - for those who dream in something besides the same twelve colors again and again... This is the group for all questionable intonational practices, be it 47-limit JI, eikosany, the Bohlen-Pierce scale, the subharmonic series, or good ol' 17-equal divisions of the octave..."

The Xenharmonic Alliance - Old Archives

(non-functional, abandoned) The original XA group, unfortunately broken since 2012. DO NOT join this group. No new posts here, but some interesting older posts.

The Xenharmonic Alliance - Mathematical Theory

"This group is a sister of the main Xenharmonic Alliance group. We created this to have a place to talk about mathematical music theory without bombarding the main group with our (often esoteric) conversation. Unlike the main group, this group is smaller and much more focused on specifically the mathematics of music theory..."

Microtonal Music and Theory

"Anything to do with microtonal music and theory."

Microtonal Music and Tuning Theory

"A censorship-free forum for sharing and discussing anything relevant to alternative musical tuning systems and music created with them."

Alternative Musical Notation Systems

"This is a place to discuss Alternative Musical Notation systems and other creative and fun musical ideas. Special emphasis given to microtonal notation. Membership is open to anyone with an active facebook profile."

Erv Wilson Discussion Group

"This group is here for people to discuss all of Erv Wilson's work."

Xenwiki Work Group

"This group is for discussion of matters related to the xenharmonic wiki, http://xen.wiki, including terminology, article content and format, wiki organization and cleanup, and open projects."

MICROTONALITALY

"A place where to exchange informations about alternative tuning systems to the usual Western one."

Tuning-specific

Just Intonation Network

(for just intonation as opposed to temperaments or EDOs)

Harmonic Series Study Group

"In this Group we study the Natural Harmonic Series of Ascending and Descending Harmonics (Overtones & Undertones) and their Combinations, exactly as they appear IN NUMERICAL FORM only.
Please post only ratios, whole (rational, integer) numbers, exponents and combinations of these. Thank you for understanding.
No cents, no “note” names, no tempered musical entities and sonic spaces (“intervals”), no staff notation, no 7-white/5-black piano keyboard and no other similar accidents of history and culture. And no “octave equivalence”...
Science, mysticism, quacademic fallacy, spiritual crap, accredited research, ancient mysteries, mainstream studies, forgotten/hidden knowledge, pseudo-science & numerology are all accepted for scholar purposes − as long as they do not insult intelligence and common sense in rampant ridiculous ways."

Small Equal Xenharmonic Temperaments

"This group is for musicians and composers working in equal temperaments other than 12-tone equal temperament, especially those with 24 notes per octave or fewer (though those working in ETs not too much larger are also welcome)."

17 Tone Theory and Pedagogy

"A group focused on the exploration and study and documentation on a 17 Tone Equal Temperament or Well Temperament. Emphasis on studying 17 and as a result creating teaching and learning materials for others. Sharing compositions intended to expand our understanding of the tuning and documenting such research with an emphasis to build on knowledge and grow in this tuning system."

22-Tone Workgroup

"A working group to explore 22-tone equal temperament and related scales and temperaments. Open to all with an interest in 22 tones!"

31-Tone Workgroup

"A working group to explore 31-tone equal temperament and related scales and temperaments. Open to all with an interest in 31 tones!"

XA - Monthly tunings

"This group is meant to be a collaborative workgroup where we vote on a tuning and then work it out together. Share what you find! Harmony, chord progressions, melodies, counterpoint, etc. Soft synths, DAWs, hardware, interfaces, etc."

Instrument making

Microtonal Guitarist

"A facebook group for JI and meta/microtonal guitarists. http://xenguitarist.com/"

Xenharmonic Musical Instrument Makers and Designers

"Xenharmonic Instrument design and manufacture."

Regional

Microtonal Projects

"Microtonal Projects is a not-for profit organisation dedicated to promoting microtonal music."

Out Of Tune Radio

(Closed Group) "With few microtonal groups out there, this group was created in order to share microtonal music with people outside microtonal communities. Its a small step so microtonal composers/performers can get more exposure. So feel free post as much works as you want in any genre. It can be in any tuning or it can be your grandmas out of tune old piano!
RULES: NO TUNING DISCUSSIONS, NO THEORY, NO MATH, LEAVE INSULTS FOR YOUR WALLS AND PMs"

UnTwelve

(Public Group, Chicago area) "The dimension of pitch in music (how high or low a certain musical sound is) remains largely tied to a standardized set of 12 notes."

MICROTONALITALY

(Public Group, Italy) "Uno spazio dove scambiare informazioni al riguardo dei sistemi di accordatura alternativi al consueto sistema in uso in Occidente."

Xenharmonic Alliance UK

(Closed Group) "Concerts and conferences about microtonal music in the UK. Meet other microtonalists."

Rhythm

Composers Capable of Complicated Rhythms

(rhythm theory, not tuning theory)
"This site is about sharing your own works of advanced rhythmic structures, or someone else's work. The point is to share, as well as to appreciate rhythmic sophistication."

Xenrhythmic Alliance and its associated Xenrhythm Wiki

(rhythm theory, not tuning theory)
"A group dedicated to the exploration and study of complex rhythmic ideas including but not limited to fractional time signatures, rhythm progressions, polyrhythms, microrhythm, and polytempo.

See also

• Notable facebook threads

Yahoo groups

(not nearly as active as facebook, but they once were, and are still a good resource for research)

Yahoo tuning list - the oldest mailing list about tuning. (formerly http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/tuning/)

Yahoo tuning-math list - An outgrowth of [tuning], a haven for the math-savvy. Much of contemporary temperament theory was developed by people here. (formerly http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/tuning-math/)

Yahoo MakeMicroMusic list - Another outgrowth of [tuning], in the direction of, let's hear some music! The emphasis is on sharing original microtonal music, which sometimes unfortunately devolves into endless tech-talk. (formerly http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/MakeMicroMusic/)

Educational websites

Selected beginning tuning theory sites

• Kite Giedraitis's site, has a book on tuning theory, good for beginners http://tallkite.com/
• Gary Garrett's site, very JI-oriented, lots of lattices http://www.garygarrett.me/
• Kyle Gann's site, with some good writing about just intonation https://www.kylegann.com/microtonality.html
• Huygens-Fokker foundation (lots about 31-edo and B-P) http://www.huygens-fokker.org/index_en.html http://www.huygens-fokker.org/bpsite/
  • Microtonal discography: https://www.huygens-fokker.org/music/discography.html
• Chris Morda's website (guitar-oriented, lots about JI) https://microtonal-guitar.com/
• John O'Sullivan's site http://www.johnsmusic7.com

Selected advanced tuning theory sites

• Graham Breed's site, which has a temperament finder: http://x31eq.com/
  • Giant list of regular temperaments: http://x31eq.com/catalog2.html
• Joseph Monzo's site, with an encyclopedia of microtonal music theory: http://www.tonalsoft.com
• A mirror of Gene Ward Smith's site: http://lumma.org/tuning/gws/home.htm]
• Carl Lumma's site: http://lumma.org/tuning/]
• The authorized Erv Wilson archives: http://anaphoria.com/wilson.html
• Herman Miller's site: https://www.prismnet.com/~hmiller/music/index.html^{[dead link]}
• Dave Keenan's site: http://dkeenan.com/Music/index.htm
• Margo Schulter's site (medieval music): http://www.medieval.org/emfaq/harmony/pyth.html
• David J. Finnamore's site: http://www.elvenminstrel.com/music/tuning/tuning.shtml
• Kees van Prooijen's site: http://www.kees.cc/music/music.html
• Carlo Serafini's site: http://www.seraph.it/index.html
• University of New South Wales (Australia) site about music acoustics https://newt.phys.unsw.edu.au/music/
• Ernst Terhardt's site about acoustics and psychoacoustics https://www.ei.tum.de/fileadmin/tueifei/mmk/Personen/Terhardt/ter.html
• What Music Really İs: http://whatmusicreallyis.com/
• Siemen Terpstra's Writings: http://siementerpstra.com/
• Legacy Xenharmonic Wiki: A fork of an older version of this wiki which preserves an earlier approach to regular temperament theory

Selected world music sites

www.maqamworld.com

"A non-commercial, educational web site dedicated to helping musicians understand the maqam or modal system used in classical Arabic music. Maqam World attempts to simplify the subject for the Arabic music beginner, while trying hard to remain correct and not exclude any essential information."

khoomei.com/

"The Web's Most Comprehensive Site for Throat-singing, Overtone Singing, Harmonic Singing, Chanting, Online Lessons, and More"

Instrument makers

• mizzan.de/ Manufacturer of microtonal pianos, based in Berlin, Germany. Also produces recordings.
• KiteGuitar.com Manufacturer of 41-edo guitar fretboards and converter of acoustic/electric guitars and basses, based in Portland Oregon.

Selected microtonal labels and concert producers

• Split-notes: split-notes.com "Welcome to split-notes, the netlabel exclusively for free and legal downloads of microtonal music. We focus on catchy microtonal music - popular styles only... Call us the microtonal-with-a-beat record label!"
• Soon Label: Chris Vaisvil
• Free microtonal albums by a variety of composers
• American Festival of Microtonal Music (New York City): http://afmm.org/
• Boston Microtonal Society: http://bostonmicrotonalsociety.org/
• An Italian website: www.facebook.com/microtonalismo microtonalismo.com
• Los Angeles: label and concert series: microfestrecords.com, microfest.org
• Plainsound Music Edition