MEPX
Chapter 9 of 10All chapters

Chapter 9 of 10

Music around the world

Other systems.

Beyond twelve tones

Indian classical music uses ragas and microtonal inflections, Arabic maqam includes quarter tones, and Indonesian gamelan uses tunings that do not match a piano at all.

  • Rhythmic cycles such as tala can run to many beats.
  • Western notation cannot capture much of this accurately.

Popular forms

Blues, jazz, rock, hip hop, electronic and their many descendants each grew from specific communities and technologies, and borrowed from one another constantly.