2018-07-29

Cloud Crowd Found Sound - 3.0 - "Eratosthenes Round Unwaltz"

Another of these, and for the moment the last. However I am already thinking of a sequel where I'll ask people to send random English phrases for me to compose together...

This time I had the idea to start with waltz rhythm.  This did not survive contact with the enemy (I am my own worst enemy) as the three-part rhythm became too fast (for human legs) and so I ended up putting four of those together to make 12/8 time.

You'll be wondering about the title...

You're not?  Do you have no spirit of enquiry!?

The Sieve of Eratosthenes is a mathematical idea for finding prime numbers: you take all the numbers except one.  Two is your first prime, so you take that, then sieve out and discard from the rest everything divisible by two.  Three is your next surviving number, so that's prime, and now you discard everything remaining that's divisible by three.  Repeat until the infinite initial pile of numbers is gone.

This piece relates to that in that I created a phrase that repeats every bar (the numbers, if you like).  Then I added a second phrase that repeats every two bars (sieving the even numbers) and another that repeats every three bars, and so on...  This means that the phrases keep coming up in different combinations and revealing themselves in new lights...

And it is a round in as much as the different voices repeat themselves, albeit with different recurrences.

I did not go on forever, you will be pleased to hear :-)







Cast in alphabetical order of height:
Maud Cooper - Whisperphone

Simon Crowell - "Ba Da Daa"

Mary Crowell - "Beh!"

Angela van Son - "Schuft"




1 comment:

  1. This turned out really cool, Ian! I like the the triple meter and the interplay among the voices.

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