As mentioned above, it is not considered necessary for every
gamelan to have the same tuning. In fact, the variation in tuning of different
gamelan using the "same"
scale type is quite large; and the specific tuning of one
gamelan is considered to be an important part of its unique sound, its musical personality.
The fact that the
intervals are tuned differently from each other, and differently from Western
equal temperament scales, probably leads to some of the initial Western discomfort with
gamelan tuning, but an even more basic difference lies in differing concepts of what "in tune" means. Common practice in Western music not only insists on uniformity in tuning between groups, but also on extreme tuning precision within a group. If a few violinists play together, and they are not playing
pitches that are almost exactly the same
frequency , the result is considered to be painfully out of tune. This insistence on precise pitches at very consistent
intervals allows complex
harmony and
counterpoint to sound good, but it is an insistence that is not shared by all musical traditions. Many musics that do not feature complex harmony and counterpoint are traditionally played with "wide tuning". In
wide tuning , a broader band of
frequencies is perceived by musicians and listeners to be a single "in tune" note, and in fact a note with too narrow a range of frequencies is heard, in these traditions, as being thin and lifeless. In other words, the width of the tuning is an important part of the
timbre of the sound.
In many such traditions, the particular pitches that are played within the wide tuning are not important.
Gamelan tuning is a particularly fascinating case of this preference, because its ideal is actually an extremely precise version of wide tuning. In order to produce a wide-tuning sound that is considered full and lively, the instruments in a
gamelan often come in pairs. Each pair of instruments is very carefully tuned so that when they play together, the very slight difference in their
pitches will produce audible
beats in the sound. Like a piano tuner, who uses the rate of beats to tune the strings of a piano, the
gamelan maker/tuner also listens to the speed of the beats. (The piano tuner listens for beats between different notes, rather than within the same note.) In an ideal ensemble, the beat rate is the same over the entire range of all of the instruments, a most impressive feat of tuning. The beat rate of the ensemble (typically between 5 and 8 beats per second) then becomes another part of its unique characteristic sound; it is so important that a tuner may choose to alter the pitch from one octave to the next rather than altering the beat rate. (Such choices may be forced, because the difference in tuning required to produce a specific beat rate changes as the frequency changes.) Listen closely to the long notes in this
example to hear the beats produced when a pair of
gender instruments play the same part together.
Melody and harmony
Due to the modal scales and the variations in tuning, Western-style
functional harmony is not possible. However,
gamelan music often sounds as if it includes harmony rather than just a single melodic line. This is due to the thick
texture built of complex layers of melody, often with the more embellished parts playing different pitches at the same time. (See
Form and
Texture for more about this.)
