At 01:26 PM 11/18/2002 -0800, you wrote:
quoted 9 lines Okay... let's say we had 88-key grand piano and were just limited in an>Okay... let's say we had 88-key grand piano and were just limited in an
>88 note sequence. The possible combinations would amount to roughly
>
>1.3e+171
>1.3x10^171
>
>or 13 with 170 '0's after it.
>
>Now drop the 88 note limitation... "the end of all music" -- not quite.
Yeah, good example with easy maths. It's really just a matter of what you
want to limit yourself to, and as soon as you limit yourself, of COURSE
you'll be dealing with finite amounts. That's how limitations work. It's
when pesky things like infinity and other people's opinions get in the way
that muck it all up :D
I suppose there is an argument to be made about what constitutes a melody
or not, although the original argument was just tones and as has been
posted recently, we've already discarded tones of tone combinations simply
by developing tuning systems and standardized scales (major/minor chords,
not to mention the circle fifths). But even within those realms, though,
you could limit infinity to a set of only 3 major notes from a chord that
would sound good and still end up with a non-repeating sequence that would
continue on to infinity. Unless, of course, your idea of non-repeating is
"no two similar notes in sequence," but then we're back to what defines a
melody :)
And don't even let me bring up atonal music... whoops!
derek
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