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RE: Fractal Music - John Coltrane

Posted by Charles Hansen (M) on October 29, 2017 at 15:15:59

In Reply to: RE: Fractal Music - John Coltrane posted by fantja on October 29, 2017 at 07:55:15:

What is so bizarre about this is it is hard to imagine that Coltrane did this consciously. Yet the odds of him doing this accidentally are probably trillions to one - that speeding up the notes by a factor many thousands of times would result in the melody playing itself.

It begs the question "Is there such a thing as a coincidence, or is everything actually connected in ways which are unseen?"

Or, "Is tapping in to these unseen things (entities, forces?) allow for what we call "genius" or "the muse of inspiration"?

I've studied rhythmic polyrhythms in an African percussion group, and long known about the 2:3 polyrhythm that is the basis of 12:8 time - foundational to almost all African rhythms, such as the Bo Diddley beat and countless others. I also knew that a major 5th (just temperament, as played on their violins made a 3:2 frequency ratio and I would demonstrate this by marching with them - they would take two step for every 3 I would take.

Yet somehow I never knew the other simple integer ratios of all of the intervals in the just scale and never made the connection between the polyrhythms and the harmonic frequency ratios. Perhaps Coltrane did.. Considering how much work it took YouTuber Adam Neely to deconstruct just the first 8 notes of the solo, it seems unlikely. And who would have guessed that plying 200,000 notes in 6 seconds would actually yield the first 8 notes of that solo?

It almost seems better the basis for a secret message code than a musical composition... :-)

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