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Greetings, I am trying to find out more about microtones and pitch inflexions that jazz is famous for. It seems to me that there are at least 3 distinct ways that "microtones" can be produced: (1) By incorporating more frets or keys per octave in a guitar or piano for example. This would allow a person to play "in-between" "constant-pitch" notes. (2) By bending a guitar string and reaching specifically for a given intermediate pitch for example. (3) By producing inflexions by bending a guitar string or sliding over the frets quickly, where the ***time-varying inflexion itself** is the "new" note, and where the exact end points of the inflexions don't matter at all in some cases. The average value of the pitch contour and the timing would matter more. (Of course I have used the term "microtones" very loosely) Now I have found that in Indian music, there are really only 12 distinct constant-pitch interval *categories*, but additional "musical atoms" are produced via inflexions. However, since some of these inflexions are not mere ornamenations and HAVE to be used in certain phrases, it is unfair to characterize Indian music as using only 12 notes. (However, the notion that Indian music today uses "22 sruthis" is a distorted/misleading/incorrect view based on misinterpretations of ancient texts which has been dismissed by empirical data [see below]). South (and North) Indian music seems to use the 3rd category of inflexion I mentioned above. My question on jazz is: Are the pitch inflexions used purely embellishments or ornamentations or are they REQUIRED in the rendition of certain phrases? (My guess is the latter) Which of the 3 categories of microtones I mentioned above are used in Jazz? (My guess is all of them) Could I have some references to recordings by top musicians who have employed such inflexions? Thank you! Sincerely, Arvindh ps: I am a graduate student at CCRMA, Stanford, investigating current-day South Indian Classical Music using digital signal processing techniques. I am also a violin player, South Indian style, for the last 20 years. Some of my results are published and available at: http://www-ccrma.stanford.edu/~arvindh/cmt/ <html><a href="http://www-ccrma.stanford.edu/~arvindh/cmt/";>http://www-ccrma.stanford.edu/~arvindh/cmt/</a></html>
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