To perform on any device with a web browser, ideally on a smartphone
Any duration, but usually more than 15 minutes
Uses HTML5 Web Audio API. It is currently compatible with most modern desktop browsers, Chrome on Android phones and Chrome or Safari on iPhones.
The program rhythmically repeats arpeggiated C major chord with C tuned to 132Hz. When you feel that the time is right, change it to the major chord a fifth upward, using the buttons below or the swipe panel. Again, when the time is right, go back to the starting chord. Travel forward and back in a similar way by fifths ever further until you cover all the major chords reachable in that way including the starting one. After that, change the chord distance itself for fifth upward. The new interval will now be a major second (we translate all intervals to those with smallest distance, for instance, a major ninth upwards becomes a major second also upwards, while a minor sixth upwards translates into a major third downwards). Traverse all the chords reachable in this way by going forward and backward by the same interval with ever further range, as before. The endpoint of such probing is when you reach again the starting chord. When you have exhausted all the chords reachable in this way then change the interval again for a fifth upward, which now makes a major third downward. Do the same as before. The composition ends when you have exhausted all the possibilities with all the intervals.
Sections based on probing with different intervals will have different lengths. For instance, a tritone (diminished fifth) will yield only 2 chords, the starting one and the one at the distance of a tritone from it, because the tritone of a tritone yields again the starting note. A fifth, a fourth, and a minor second upwards and downwards will yield all the 12 chords within an octave. Other intervals will yield chord counts that are smaller than 12 and greater than 2. Major second upwards and downwards will yield 6 chords each. Minor third upwards and downwards will yield 4 chords each. Major third upwards and downwards will yield 3 chords each. These differences in length of various cycles of chords are due to the fact that there are 12 notes in a chromatic scale, and each interval comprises a different number of notes, from 1 to 11. The intervals that comprise number of notes which is mutually prime with 12, and these are minor seconds upward and downward, fourth and fifth (which comprise respectively 1, 11, 7 and 5 notes), yield the longest chord sequences, containing all the available chords. The others yield the fewest chords necessary to reach a multiple of 12, and these numbers for each of the remaining intervals are as stated above.
There are 779 chords to play in total. The order of chords is the following (all chords are, as is clear from what was said above, major chords):
With every chord change the manner of arpeggio changes. The program goes through all the 4-permutations of 9 notes of a major chord distributed in three octaves. There are 3024 of them (9*8*7*6). There are 16 notes in each arpeggio phrase and four new permutations are selected on each chord change.
The piece generally lasts around 1 hour. However, the performance can be shorter if the circumstances require it, but not shorter than 15 minutes. In that case, parts of the longest chord chains (those based on fifths, fourths and minor seconds) may be omitted.
Start and stop the music with Play/Pause button below. Perform the piece using the the four buttons next to it or the swipe panel below. Interval buttons have an immediate effect, while Chord buttons change notes of the chord as they appear. Swipes in four direction are also available on the above swipe surface, with the same meaning as the respective four buttons. Each button triggers one of the following events.