Thomas Nicholson

Open instrumentation with pre-recorded playback, open duration

SuperCollider, 23′

Cello & live electronic processing in SuperCollider, open duration

Quarter-tone bass flute, viola & electronic tones generated in SuperCollider, 30′ [Excerpt]

Voice, quarter-tone bass/alto flutes, trombone, violin, viola, cello & contrabass, 15′ [Excerpt]

Quarter-tone bass flute & contrabass, 30′

Short film with electronic music created in SuperCollider, 18′ [Film]

Harmonic progression for SuperCollider, optionally with acoustic instruments and/or voices, 17′ [Audio]

Two pianos in 67-limit just intonation, 4′ [Audio]

Flute, bass flute, alto saxophone, bass trombone, accordion in 12-EDO, electric guitar in 84-EDO, harp in 84-EDO, violin & cello, 18′ [Audio]

At least six instruments and/or voices, possibly with electronic accompaniment in SuperCollider, 18′ [Audio]

Quarter-tone alto flute, viola & trombone, 7′ [Audio]

Solo cello, 15′

Orchestra: 3 flutes, 3 oboes, 3 clarinets, 3 bassoons, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, bass drum, timpani, harp in just intonation & strings, 12′ [Audio]

Violin, viola & cello, 8′

High voice or alto flute, violin, clarinet in A & bass clarinet, 8′

SuperCollider, 27′ [Audio]

Horn, viola & suspended cymbal, 10′ [Audio]

Solo cello, 11′ [Audio]

First version (2015): alto saxophone & electric guitar with ebow, second version in just intonation (2019): viola & acoustic guitar with ebow, 14′ [Audio]

SuperCollider, 12′ [Audio]

Clarinet, violin, cello & accordion in 12-EDO, 10′

Piano in Sabat II well temperament, 13′ [Audio]

Violin & viola, 6′ [Audio]

Bass flute, violin, viola & cello, 9′

Three dancers, light & object installation, violin, keyboard & SuperCollider, 45′ [Excerpt]

Baroque alto flute, viola, keyboard & video installation, 15′ [Audio]

Any three sustaining instruments and/or voices, 8′ [Audio]

Site-specific installation, sculpture & film, 55′ [Film]

Flute (doubling piccolo), alto saxophone (doubling contrabass clarinet), bassoon (doubling contrabassoon), horn, tubular bells, piano in 13-limit just intonation, violin & viola, 40′

Orchestra: 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 2 trombones, tuba, tubular bells & strings, 5′

Orchestra: 3 flutes, 2 oboes, 3 clarinets, 3 bassoons, 4 horns, 3 trumpets, 3 trombones, percussion (3 players), harp, organ & strings, 17′ [Audio]

Introductory lecture (English translation) originally titled “Avant, avec et après Harry Partch” presenting the life, work and theories of Harry Partch. [Link]

This essay documents some initial speculations regarding how harmonies (might) evolve in extended just intonation, connecting back to various practices from two perspectives that have been influential to my work. The first perspective, which is the primary investigation, concerns itself with an intervallic conception of just intonation, centring around Harry Partch’s technique of Otonalities and Utonalities interacting through Tonality Flux: close contrapuntal proximities bridging microtonal chordal structures. An analysis of Partch’s 1943 composition “Dark Brother”, one of his earliest compositions to use this technique extensively, is proposed, contextualised within his 43-tone Monophonic system and greater aesthetic interests. This is followed by further approaches to just intonation composition from the perspective of the extended harmonic series and spectral interaction in acoustic sounds. Recent works and practices from composers La Monte Young, Éliane Radigue, Ellen Fullman, and Catherine Lamb are considered, with a focus on the shifting modalities and neighbouring partials in Lamb’s string quartet “Divisio Spiralis” (2019). Finally, I connect this discussion to my current compositional interests, which have been exploring a method of microtonal modulation through arbitrarily near enharmonic connections in Harmonic Space called “enharmonic proximities.” [Link]

While temperament may present some apparent advantages, it necessarily sacrifices the distinct “JI fusion sonority” of intervals that are precisely tuneable by ear. These manifest a vast gradation of consonance and dissonance, as yet largely unexplored and with fascinating potential for new compositions. This article proposes a novel approach, based on a mathematical structure called the Stern-Brocot Tree, allowing a finite set of pitches to be generated in just intonation within which music may modulate freely without relying on temperament. [Link]

Revised symbols for primes up to 47 including a detailed legend explaining each symbol and a notation example of the harmonic and subharmonic series. [Link]

Natural harmonics, i.e. partials and their harmonic series, may be isolated on a vibrating string by lightly touching specific points along its length. In addition to the two endpoints, stationary nodes for a given partial n present themselves at n−1 locations along the string, dividing it into n parts of equal length. It is not the case, however, that touching any one of these nodes will necessarily isolate the nth partial and its integer multiples. The subset of nodes that will activate the nth partial (termed playable nodes by the authors) may be derived by following a mathematically predictable pattern described by so-called Farey sequences. The authors derive properties of these sequences and connect them to physical phenomena. This article describes various musical applications: locating single natural harmonics, forming melodies of neighbouring harmonics, sounding multiphonic aggregates, as well as predicting the relative tuneability of just intervals. [Link]

A software review of microtonal just intonation playback capabilities in Dorico 2, with technical examples. [Link]

An introduction to concepts underlying just intonation and other microtonal tuning systems, first used as a course text in the tuning seminar at the Universität der Künste Berlin. [Link]

A sans serif typeface specially designed for creating technical texts about just intonation. Features include integrated inline HEJI accidentals (*ff *f *n *s *ss *fu5 *no25 *o7 *u7 *o13 *o31 etc) accessed through OpenType ligatures, as well as contextual forms and refined positoning of fractions (15/8, 13/7, 25/3 etc) and ratios (81:80, 225:224, 728:729 etc). Work in progress.

An online synthesiser and interactive visualisation of the harmonic series in the form of a logarithmic spiral. This model is based on Erv Wilson’s 1965 publication as well as Catherine Lamb’s related creative and pedagogical practice. Desktop use only! [Link]

This package is a simple LaTeX implementation of the Helmholtz-Ellis JI Pitch Notation that allows for in-line typesetting of microtonal accidentals for use within theoretical texts, program notes, symbol legends, etc. [Link]

An web app for analysis, composition, and performance preparation of music composed in microtonal just intonation. [Link]