User:Mousemambo

Eric, aka mouse, has been an amateur musician for many years. Trained in the Western classical music tradition, he plays flute and frame drums, and also creates music in DAWs. After being a life-long listener to classical Indian music, he's also been studying Hindustani raga with an experienced teacher. Drawing together his enjoyment of xenharmonic tunings with the just intonation of classical Indian music, he's been deepening his knowledge and understanding through study and creation. His focus here at the Xenharmonic Wiki is on beginner guides for practical tuning issues, basic foundational articles helpful to people just getting into the musical worlds outside 12-EDO tunings, and support for musicians playing classical Indian music who want to use microtonal electronic instruments.

You can contact mouse on his talk page.

Project Ideas

• Mousemambo/Tuning files. Add this new page. What are tuning files, what do they do, what are some formats? This will expand on the brief descriptions elsewhere, and link to the Anamark v2 page appropriately.
• Add "See: Tuning files" as appropriate to the articles that currently reference them.
• Mousemambo/Indian music. Replace the existing article "Indian" which, by the way, has a bizarre and dismaying page title. Provide some history and current usage of tuning selections in the various branches of Indian music, and links to outside information.
• Add some "how to" information for people just beginning their journey, either as additions to existing pages or by creating new ones as appropriate. E.g. How to use tuning files, how to select which ones, how to get your electronic or software instrument to use one. These types of pages live in Category:Guides.
• Category: Tuning mechanisms. Probably not that category name, but something that would encompass all articles about how electronic instruments are made to adhere to alternative (non-12-EDO) tunings. "Practical tuning" or "Tuning practices" or "Tuning technique" (currently in use but deprecated with redirect) or "Tuning practice" perhaps? I note that the current Category:Tuning is about the theoretical side and not at all the practical side. However, it might instead be best to stick everything in there, practical and theoretical, although that's not the direction I currently lean toward.

Practical Tuning for Beginners Pages

Below is a list of existing pages (still expanding by search, as of August 2023) relevant to beginners who want to set their electronic instruments to other than 12-EDO tuning. Synth/sampler manuals frequently don't provide enough background information, instead assuming you already know something about tuning files.

It's useful to consider the trajectory of beginners newly arriving at the wiki. The wiki's front page has a section "If you are new to musical tuning" that doesn't get into practical how-to issues, but the page also has a very appropriate and helpful section "Practical xenharmonics" (Useful Tools, List of microtonal software plugins, Microtonal instruments). "Useful tools" simply redirects to the "List of music software" page, which seems sensible if inconsistent.

Related to that visitor's initial likely trajectory, note that the wiki's main sidebar also includes a section "Practice" with links underneath to some essential starting points for people seeking practical tuning guidance, especially "Software" and (of less relevance to this work) "Pedagogy." Also in that sidebar, "Useful Tools" (redirects to List of music software) is listed under "Theory" which is odd unless you know how useful the "practice" tools are for better understanding theory.

• Categories with practical tuning articles:
  • Category:Tuning
  • Category:Guides
  • Category:Software
  • Category:Practice
  • Category:Pedagogy
  • Category:Tuning technique (a soft redirect to Category:Regular temperament tuning, otherwise would be an attractive category for all tuning file and closely related pages)
• List of music software. Good page with ongoing maintenance activity. Linked to from the Main Page in the "Practical xenharmonics" section, as a "Useful tools" redirect.
• List of microtonal software plugins. Very important page at this time (August 2023), well maintained with updates. Linked to from the Main Page in the "Practical xenharmonics" section.
• Pedagogy. Excellent page with a name that unfortunately doesn't scream, "New folks start here!" "Education" would be better because it's more common, or "Learn" is even more common. An important page because there's a link to it in the wiki's default sidebar. Understandably focused on tuning theory, not practical issues.
• New Tuning Method. Relevant, but mostly outdated page whose last substantial update was June 2016, so no mention of MTS-ESP, MPE or tuner plugins.
• Creating Scala scl files for rank two temperaments. Beginners won't know what a "rank two temperament" is or what Scala does.
• Pedagogy questions. Old abandoned page.
• PedagogyTradeoffs. Redirects to the "Pedagogy questions" page section: When_is_learning_a_microtonal_system_of_pitches_harder_than_learning_the_12-equal_system.3F_When_is_it_easier.3F
• MicroPedagogyCollective. Old abandoned page.
• Useful Tools. Redirects to the List of music software.
• Anamark tuning file format. A good page already. Too bad there isn't an equivalent for Scala SCL/KBM file formats!
• Scala. Has a brief section on tuning files, which needs "See: Tuning files" added.
• DAWs. The section "Approaches to Microtonal Composition in a DAW" has some good info about practical tuning issues.

Indian Music

Existing pages addressing microtonality in Indian music.

• To be expanded.

Toolkit

• to be developed