The Microtone Fox

Just intonation, equal temperaments, regular temperaments, combination product sets & others… What Is Microtonality? If you’ve ever played a piano or guitar, you’ve been working within a system called  twelve-tone equal temperament , or  12-TET  for short. This is the dominant tuning system in Western music, and it works by dividing the octave into exactly twelve equal steps, called semitones. Each of those twelve steps is precisely the same size as every other, which makes it very convenient. A piano tuned this way sounds equally in-tune (or equally slightly out-of-tune, depending on your perspective) in every musical key. It’s a brilliant compromise that has powered centuries of Western classical, jazz, pop, and rock music. But here’s the thing — it  is  a compromise. The intervals in 12-TET are somewhat close to, but  not exactly , the pure mathematical ratios that occur naturally in the physics of sound. And the twelve notes don’t come anywhere near...