Going by the wayside, I picked up a number of tuning systems by retuning my Yamaha keyboard and improvising. ( Because I'm too lazy to write anything concrete ). Through out this experience, I gained alot of knowledge about xenharmonic music. I tried 16 and 22 first and loved both of them. I also worked with 13, 14, 22, and 19.
It was then I wrote a post on the facebook group saying that I have done alot with lower divisions of the octave with the exception of 9, 10, and 15. I was suggested to try 15 which at the time new next to nothing about. I eagerly began listening to some 15 tone music and loading some scales on my keyboard.
A 15 TONE JOURNEY
The only thing I really knew about 15 was that it had porcupine like 22 did, but that it was lesser in tune. That was all I knew about it at the time. So upon beginning my exploration into uncharted territory, I was starkly surprised.
15 is, in a word... different. Like, when I tried 16, it had a nice melancholy sound, very easy to write melody in. But 15, well... it had this angular, chunky quality which I initially didn't like. But something fascinated me about it. I think it was how small it was and how strange it worked.
For those unfamiliar with xen, divisions of 5 are very strange. Being used to 12 which isn't divisible by 5, the sound of 5 can take some getting used to. In 12 tone we have the nice whole tone scale which is a 6 tone scale or the 4 note diminished seventh chord. In 15, we have neither of those, we have this 5 note equal scale.
It sounds NOTHING like seriously NOTHING like anything I have heard aside from a few encounters with Gamelan music. It's very south-asian flavored, like Indonesian, or tropical. It is really friggin cool to have at your disposal. But there is something else about it, it sounds fun. And that stroke me about 15 in general.
In my exploration of xen, most scales had a generally colder, depressing quality to them. It was likely my limited aural comprehension at the time but that was how I interpreted them. 15 being based in this 5 x 3 framework was capable of sounding fun, and almost cheesy. It felt sugary, but also tropical like some mixed drink at a tropical result or some shit like that. That's not the end all of the system, but sounding like that isn't difficult.
NEW SOUNDS AND MOODS
Going back to the 5 note scale, 15 has three of them similar to the way 12 has 3 of those diminished seventh chords you play at halloween parties. Thus you could think of it like 5 x 3 rather than 4 x 3. This scale was called 5-equal or some odd name like equipentatonic which sounds crazy. Me and a friend came up with the name Pentatonal Scale or "Pende Scale" for short. It is, in essence, a cross between Pentatonic scale, and Whole Tone scale. But don't go try playing it expecting Jason to visit you this Halloween, all you'll get is may'be a mimosa from a waiter of an invitation to Indonesia.
One reason 15 is so bizarre despite it's close size to 12 is that it has two principle....... "tones........"
I ridiculously over exaggerate that because they are barely tones at all. One of them at 160 cents is so narrow it's basically a neutral second, dead between the whole tone and half tone. The other is one step of the pendetonal scale which is some second-third limbo freak of nature. It is by far, the most difficult interval to sing or get used to. 24 has a similar interval but the difference is 15 FORCES you to rely on it along with it's weird flat as hell second.
The fact that this system lacks anything resembling a whole tone makes it tricky to get used to. I bought an M-audio keyboard to rekey to 22 Tone and ended up going to 15 because 22 was kinda stupid given I couldn't reach anything near octave length. Playing xen music on a keyboard set up to the tuning is game changing, it's a whole new experience. However once that "newness" wears off, you gotta buckle down and practice it daily if you wanna get good at playing it. That on top of the fact that you have to learn to expect what things will sound like in an alien tuning system.
A RATHER ODD CHAIN OF FIFTHS
Something weird happens in 15 and any multiple of 5 where the best representation of the perfect fifth is 720 cents. Five of them leads you to the note you started on. I know, I didn't believe it either till I tried it. You get five fifths and you are back where you started, that's it. The reason is pendetonal scale in which 720 cents is one of the intervals. So like, you know how if you stack major sixths in 12 tone you'll get the same notes as a diminished seventh chord? Think about it, C A F# D# then if you stack another, from D#, it's B# which is C right?
In 15, the same kind of voodoo happens but with fifths. Stack five you are back to whatever you started on. The thing is, at first, you're brain can't hear it that way. You expect that sixth note to be a new note and the odd thing is, we tend to hear it as a sixth pitch that really doesn't exist. It's hard to unlearn 12 habits. Oh NO! Someone broke the circle of fifths!! Welcome to Pentaland, dude.
