Fredrik Rasten

Harmony for six voices(2017, reworked 2019 and 2021)

On this piece and its development:This piece is one of my first compositions in just intonation written in 2017 for a quartet of friends, Torstein Lavik Larsen on trumpet, Vilde Alnæs on violin, Inga Aas on viola dagamba and myself on e-bowed acoustic guitar.
The first iteration of the piece was just the 5-limit harmony and the modulation between the G and the E fundamental, with the note B constantly working with the syntonic comma, topivot this modulation. In 2019 I made a sextet arrangement, adding 7-, 11- and 13-limit notes to the 5-limit “base” of the piece.
Now, in 2021, I have made this new arrangement of the piece after fruitful e-mail correspondence with Jeff Gavett about an arrangement for the vocal group Ekmeles.
One of the elements I usually rely on in my composing and in my praxis within harmonic space / just intonation, is the concept of tunability, and as this early piece of mine lacked a“reliable” common note to bridge the modulations of the two harmonic levels, I added the note A to bridge the gap between the G and the E levels. I use the term level here as opposed
to fundamental because the addition of the pythagorean A to the E fundamental chords in itself modulates the harmony one fifth down to A fundamental. Therefore, the A has to leaveat some points, to let the E-fundamental pitches enter the spotlight, before entering again to bridge the harmony safely back to the G-fundamental via A again.
This arrangement also utilizes rhythmic notation for the first time, although the tempo and meter can be quite flexible.
I am very grateful for Jeff Gavett’s collaboration, and this opportunity for me to develop the piece further.
Fredrik Rasten,
September 2021

Interpretational notes:
The dynamic of the piece is generally free and open to experimentation, depending on the performance space etc.
However, tunability, clarity and resonance are all important keywords to this music.
Each bar should last the length of a deep breath (a breath, either close to as slow as possible or slightly faster).
I would also suggest that each bar has a very slight and slow crescendo up until near the end of the bar before easing down.
This crescendo should not be dramatic, but rather subtle. It is also just a suggestion, and the music can very well be realized superbly without it,
it is more something to keep as a mindset, to let each bar have its own subtle evolution.
The instrumental or vocal timbre should be full throughout, with the possibility of subtle changes.
Vocalists should sing on a ‘Oooo’ or ‘Aaaaa’ vowel.
If notes fall outside of the register of a voice or instrument, feel free to experiment with octave transpositions for the notes in question.
However, beware that this might affect the tunability of the harmony.
A more viable solution might be to simply transpose the whole score to a different key.

Each note (except A) deviates from 12-TET, with the cent deviation given under each note.
Apostrophes (´) are shown for vocalists, meaning that despite no pause given in the staff notation, one can take a short pause and breathe here
(breaths can of course also occur, if needed, within a held note).
The accidentals belong to the Extended Helmholtz-Ellis JI pitch notation by Marc Sabat
and Wolfgang von Schweinitz.
More information about the accidentals: http://www.marcsabat.com/pdfs/notation.pdf