The Boston Microtonal Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to the composition, performance and study of microtonal music. Since its creation in 1988, BMS has been devoted to raising the awareness of musicians and audiences of the expanded and enhanced expressive possibilities of composing, improvising and performing new music with new musical intervals. For over two decades, BMS has pursued its mission through concert series, workshops, and classes in the Boston area. Among its most important current initiatives are:
• NotaRiotous, directed by James Bergin, founded in 2005 as a chamber ensemble devoted exclusively to the performance of microtonal music of the 20th and 21st centuries. The musicians of NotaRiotous are some of Boston's most sought-after performers of contemporary music.
• Jonathan Keith Scholarship, a grant of $500 given every academic year by the Jonathan Keith Fund and BMS to a student at the New England Conservatory who is actively studying and creating music with microtones.
Interpretations of the term "microtonal" vary widely, and for our purposes it is useful to note the following two basic types of usage:
1) The most literal and narrow definition of the word "microtone" has as its reference point the Western "tone" (whole tone). If a semitone is "half" of a tone (in terms of cents *), then anything smaller is classified as a microtone, or microinterval, according to this definition. (More specific names are "quarter-tone," "fifth-tone," "eighth-tone," "sixth-tone," etc.)
* Alexander J. Ellis' system for measurement of musical intervals, in which the equal-tempered semitone equals 100 cents, the whole tone 200 cents, the octave 1200 cents, and so on.
2) The most general, inclusive—and most common—usage of the term "microtonal" is its application to any music made using intervals other than the traditional intervals of 12-note equal temperament (with its multiples of 100-cent semitones and 200-cent whole tones), which has been the standard tuning for Western music since the mid 19th century.
If we consider this second, more general application, we can easily see that there are a variety of artistic, theoretical and philosophical channels through which musicians may be drawn to those "other intervals." As a result there are a few different disciplines, only loosely inter-related, all of which may fall into the category "microtonality." These include:
• the practice of simply adding pitches to 12-note equal temperament (most often through microtonal equal temperaments such as 24-note (quarter-tones), 36-note (sixth-tones), 48-note, 72-note, 96-note, etc.)
• contemporary pure tuning methods such as the various modern forms of just intonation, Pythagorean and mean-tone tunings
• historically accurate tunings of Medieval, Renaissance, Baroque and Classical pieces
• the study of non-Western tuning systems
As an organization BMS has always presented a variety of approaches to microtonality. However, our activities in general are centered more on the creative and practical aspects of music-making than on pre-compositional tuning theory, and we do favor music in which the "new" pitches are audible materials for musical innovation (as opposed to historical tunings, for example). There are an abundance of resources on the Web for the tuning-theory, acoustical, musicological and ethnomusicological branches of the field. (Click here for some links.)
We hope that newcomers and experts alike will find this website informative, and in the spirit of perpetual learning we invite you to share with us your own insights and questions.
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Joe Maneri received his formal compositional and theoretical training from Joseph Schmidt (himself a pupil of Alban Berg), between 1946 and 1957 in New York. During this time Maneri also developed notoriety as a performer of jazz and Greek folk music on the clarinet. In 1970 he came to the New England Conservatory, and since then has served in the Theory, Composition, Third Stream and Jazz departments. For over twenty years he has been teaching what is probably the only college course in microtonal ear-training and compositional theory in the country. Other contributions to the field of microtonalism include the co-authoring with Scott VanDuyne of Preliminary Exercises in the Virtual Pitch Continuum [Accentuate Music] (a book of ear-training and compositional exercises in seventy-two note equal temperament), the designing of a seventy-two note keyboard, and the founding of the Boston Microtonal Society in 1988.
Maneri's unique voice as both a composer and saxophonist has for many years been a strong influence in Boston and New York. In recent years his music has also become extremely popular in Europe, where he has been performing and making recordings with the Joe Maneri Quartet for the Leo, ECM, and Hat Hut labels.
Maneri website
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James Bergin is a composer, conductor and violist. He began studying harmony with Joseph Maneri at the New England Conservatory in 1971. After leaving NEC to pursue music study on a private basis, he continued to work with Maneri for more than a decade, studying harmony, species counterpoint, fugue and composition, using Arnold Schoenberg's pedagogical texts. In 1991 he returned to NEC to complete a degree in music theory with Maneri as his principal teacher. He concentrated on the study of microtones, began composing in 72-note equal temperament, and studied theory, orchestration and ethnomusicology with Daniel Pinkham, Robert Cogan, Lee Hyla and Robert Labaree.
He taught music theory at the NEC preparatory department and was one of the founding faculty members at the Rivers Music School, where he taught solfège, violin and viola. He continues to teach harmony and counterpoint using the Schoenberg approach and texts, and his students have been accepted into music programs at the New England Conservatory, Boston University, the Hartt School of Music and others.
His compositions include tonal and microtonal works for solo instruments, voice and chamber ensemble, chorus, piano and organ. He orchestrated and assisted with the composition of the music for the Merchant/Ivory film “Jane Austen in Manhattan.” Seufzer , for solo flute, and Kyrie, for baritone, viola and cello were performed on the debut NotaRiotous concert in November of 2006. His fugue for voices, “Surely, He Hath Borne Our Griefs” was performed in March of 2007 by the Cantilena Chamber Choir at their Berkshire Composers Concert in Williamstown, MA.
He studied conducting privately with Boris Barkan, and also worked with Tamar Brooks at the New England Conservatory. He led the Junior Youth Repertory Orchestra at the New England Conservatory for three years, during which time he commissioned and premiered pieces by Gary Philo, Thomas Oboe Lee and Ezra Sims—the latter using pitches from the 72-note octave. He was the music director at Lexington Christian Academy for almost 20 years, where he conducted performances of major choral works with orchestra by Bach, Charpentier, Handel, Vivaldi and others.
He studied viola with George Neikrug and premiered several works for the Composers in Red Sneakers series in the 1980s. He was a member of Helios, a Middle Eastern/avant-garde improvisation quartet. He performed Joseph Maneri's solo viola piece Osanj on the debut NotaRiotous concert in November of 2006, and has also appeared with Maneri in concerts of free microtonal improvisation. He is a member of the Berkshire Symphony in Williamstown, MA. He now lives in the Berkshires where he composes, teaches privately, freelances and works in the Orchestra and Score departments of Broude Brothers Limited.
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(Painting by Sonja Holzwarth Maneri) |
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Julia Werntz earned her Bachelor's Degree in Performance on the oboe from the New England Conservatory in 1988, studied composition independently with Joe Maneri for several years, and in 2000 earned her Ph.D. in Composition and Theory from Brandeis University. Starting in fall 2007 she will be teaching the Microtonal Composition and Performance course at the New England Conservatory, created by Joseph Maneri, and she also teaches music theory and composition at Northeastern University.
Since the mid 1990s her music, mostly chamber and solo pieces, has been almost exclusively microtonal. Her music has been performed on concert series and festivals around the Northeastern United States and Europe, and can be heard on the CD All In Your Mind: Music of Julia Werntz and John Mallia (Capstone). She also has written a few articles on microtonal and other contemporary music, most notoriously: "Adding Pitches: Some New Thoughts, Ten Years After Perspectives Of New Music's 'Forum: Microtonality Today'" in Perspectives of New Music (vol. 39, no. 2).
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