Augmented/Diminished tuning fan club?!

[EZ-Slider]

Where did you hear that augmented was choppy? It’s no more choppy than any chromatic harmonica. How could it be any more so? That doesn’t make any sense.
[/quote]
Like I said feel free to school me and tell me what you like abt it. From my limited understanding of augmented it has an added number of breath changes to play a scale. As well as having 4 patterns for your 12 major scales.


                 

[Gnarly He Man]

From my limited understanding of augmented it has an added number of breath changes to play a scale. As well as having 4 patterns for your 12 major scales.

Some keys are more legato on certain tunings.
I have a video where I play Amazing Grace without taking a breath.

[streetlegal]

The choice between augmented and diminished would probably come down to how you feel about enharmonics. If you don't like them and prefer to have a place for each note and every note in just one place, then augmented would be a better choice. But if you like having some duplicate notes available, providing some variation in scale layout which you may consider useful in playing terms, then diminished would be a better choice. No tuning is 'better' than another, but personal preference is king when making decisions, so it would pay to spend some time thinking about which option you would feel more comfortable with.

[EZ-Slider]

That is why I am into dimi.. Now with a bit of playing it under my belt I am in love! The harmonics offer some very nice phrasing options and nice lateral legato lines. I can understand the argument that having more than one place for some move could be confusing, but I play a guitar with 6 strings and a bass trombone with 2 valves giving me every note in at least 3 but up to 6 locations. Sure it can be a bit to lee track of at times with the latter, but it makes certain things I lot less work to play.
But PLEASE SAXONY feel free to give your reasons on augmented. Like I said I would prob do it on a 10 hole if i did.
EZ

[SaxonyFan]

A few points about assumptions implicitly being made here:

(1) Fewer breath changes are better.

That’s a strange assumption to me. One of the things that I struggle with the most is getting lines with hole change sequences of blow only or draw only to not sound mushy.

(2) The sound of the major scale played ascending or descending should be the criteria for judging the “legatoness” of an instrument.

Another strange assumption. We don’t just play the pitches of a major scale in sequence when making music. If one wanted to design the most legato instrument possible for music in general then determining which intervals are played most frequently would be the first step. If, for example, the minor third was easily the most used interval then the dimi would be the most legato tuning for the chrome. If it was the major third then it would be the augy. How about solo tuning? I don’t know.

And if you still think that a scale should be the criterion then why not the chromatic scale?

And most importantly: No matter which tuning you choose you have to get good at making breath changes sound fluid and you have to get good at making non-breath changes (with hole changes) sound less mushy. So maybe pick another criteria?

[Gnarly He Man]

We don’t just play the pitches of a major scale in sequence when making music

Most melodies employ scale fragments—and arpeggios.

[SaxonyFan]

We don’t just play the pitches of a major scale in sequence when making music

Most melodies employ scale fragments—and arpeggios.

Most melodies employ the chromatic scale.

[EZ-Slider]

Somehow I feel a lot like the fella in Monty Python.. "I came in here for an argument" accept I came in here for a simple discussion about the benefits of dimi or augmented tuning. No need for offence or defence.
 

[SaxonyFan]

Somehow I feel a lot like the fella in Monty Python.. "I came in here for an argument" accept I came in here for a simple discussion about the benefits of dimi or augmented tuning. On need for offence or defence.
             

Hmm. That’s what I see happening, EZ.

“... next door. It's being-hit-on-the-head lessons in here.”

[Gnarly He Man]

Somehow I feel a lot like the fella in Monty Python.. "I came in here for an argument" accept I came in here for a simple discussion about the benefits of dimi or augmented tuning. On need for offence or defence.

Well, you certainly can't retune to augmented with Blu-Tac!
So that's one for your side.
I have a different tuning I usually go to bat for, hooray for our side.

[Gnarly He Man]

We don’t just play the pitches of a major scale in sequence when making music

Most melodies employ scale fragments—and arpeggios.

Most melodies employ the chromatic scale.

Most?

[EZ-Slider]

So
please do tell.. Why do you prefer augmented to dimi so?

[Gnarly He Man]

I don't think he has tried dimi.

[EZ-Slider]

Lol.
Your batted for tuning is neat and did tempt me a little.. If I had been deeper into solo I would have likely gone bebop.. Had avoided my hold 4 and 8 Cs like the plague for some time as I knew I would be changing to powerchrom eventually..

[Gnarly He Man]

Power Chromatic Slide needs it's own fan club page LOL

[EZ-Slider]

Rofl Rofl..
Has some good points. I had already half valved my 56 in anticipation of making the switch.. Thinking abt making it a half valued Gb dimi.. Should be fun.. That reminds me need to send you an email

[SaxonyFan]

So
please do tell.. Why do you prefer augmented to dimi so?

1. There is one place to find each pitch and that place is found within a simple sequence of breath, slide and hole changes. This makes it easy to learn where all pitches (pitches not notes) are in an absolute or relative sense and dramatically reduces the time needed to become a true ear player.

2. An octave fits into only three holes thereby making some interval jumps smaller in distance. Good for nimble play.

3. Cuts the cost of the instrument. With a 12 hole augy I get 4 octaves. With a solo I would have to purchase a 16 hole instrument at greater cost to obtain the same range. I think the ideal augy would be a 10 hole but alas ...

4. Fewer holes, reeds and valves for a given range means less maintenance.

5. A shorter slide means less friction.

[EZ-Slider]

Pretty good points.. Yes a 10 hole 3.3 octave instrument is petty tempting. Can you point of towards and writings with note layouts and patterns? Found lots on dimi but not on augy.

[SaxonyFan]

Pretty good points.. Yes a 10 hole 3.3 octave instrument is petty tempting. Can you point of towards and writings with note layouts and patterns? Found lots on dimi but not on augy.

The layout in the first three holes for an augy starting on C would look like this:

Blow, out      C     E    G#   
Blow, in        C#   F    A
Draw, out     D     F#  A#
Draw, in       D#   G    B

However I auralize it as: C  C#  D  D#  E   F   F#  G   G#  A  A#  B and I never think of these notes. Instead I internally hear the pitches that I want to play and then I play them.

Some people say there are 4 patterns for each scale on the augmented tuned chrom. I guess that is true for those that visualize the instrument but I don’t visualize it - I auralize it. I eliminate the extra step of visualization and go directly for auralization. Music, after is about sound, not sight. So to me any scale or any phrase feels like just one musical pattern no matter the key.

[Gnarly He Man]

We don’t just play the pitches of a major scale in sequence when making music

Most melodies employ scale fragments—and arpeggios.

Most melodies employ the chromatic scale.

Most?

“ Most melodies consist of more than two pitches and draw their tonal material from scales or modes.”

https://he.kendallhunt.com/sites/default/files/uploadedFiles/Kendall_Hunt/Content/Higher_Education/Uploads/Hast_09_Ch06.pdf

Same page:
“ Western musicians also recognize a twelve-pitch scale called the chro- matic scale, in which five of the diatonic steps are subdivided. This set of pitches represents all the white and black keys on the piano within one octave. Until the twentieth century, these chromatic pitches were always regarded as somewhat auxiliary to the prevailing diatonic scale pitches. As we will see later in this chapter, Indian and Arabic music systems have somewhat similar concepts.”

[streetlegal]

SaxonyFan sets out the case for augmented, which I find hard to find fault with, especially as someone who doesn't have any real use for duplicated pitches within a layout. A spiral layout will also eliminate some of the duplicated pitches in a systematic way which I find even more appealing in terms of organic progression than augmented, but there are still a few enharmonic notes in the layout and you could not get 4 octaves from a 12 hole spiral chromatic.

[Brendan Power]

Just checking into this thread...

Actually, you CAN have Enharmonic notes in Augmented Tuning. If you half-valve it, every draw note will bend a semitone, slide-in and slide-out. I call these Bend-Enharmonics. They can make a lot of difference, by giving you alternate choices on half the notes on the chromatic! They can be used to add soul to a note by giving you a nicer tone and vibrato, or make phrasing a lot easier than choosing the built-in note. Here are the Bend-Enharmonics available:

1. Every slide-in blow note can be substituted with a slide-out draw bend.
2. Every slide-out draw note can be substituted with a slide-in draw bend.

That's 6 notes per octave, 18 notes in a 3 octave range. It's a lot of extra options to have, and can help reduce the 'choppy' nature of Augmented Tuning (which has been mentioned) by giving you the same scale or phrase with fewer slide moves. That can help smooth out (and speed up) your phrasing a lot, if used cleverly.

BEND-ENHARMONICS IN DIMINISHED TUNING
A similar thing can be done with Diminished tuning, with even more beneficial effect. If the chromatic is half-valved and you use draw-bends instead of slide pushes to get your scales, you can reduce the three patterns necessary to play in all 12 keys to just two, by using Bend-Enharmonics instead of slide moves. For example, using the 12 major scales as an example

1. A pattern using draw bends starting on a slide-out blow note. It covers 4 keys: C, Eb, F#, A
1a. A pattern using draw bends exactly the same as pattern 1, but with the slide in. It covers the keys of C#, E, G, Bb
2. A pattern using draw bends starting on a slide-out draw note (D). It covers the keys of D, F, G#, B

You also have the option of playing pattern 2 with the slider in (call it 2a), which will give you an alternative version of the scales in pattern 1: C, Eb, F#, A.

For those of you wanting to half-valve your Diminished chrom and try playing in all 12 keys with Bend-Enharmonics replacing slider moves, see the attached pics showing Phrase Maps of how to play the 12 major scales without slide pushes. On a diatonic harmonica you still need three patterns. On a slider version of Diminished, you can reduce the patterns needed to play in all 12 keys to two if you wish... That's pretty amazing, in my opinion.