Think of all the great electric
guitarists from the last 50 years who have stretched strings, played
with a slide or yanked on a whammy bar in their search for just the
right note. Now, try to imagine their music without any bent notes.
Seems a little dull, doesn't it? That's because microtones - the notes
that fall between the half-step intervals of a guitar's fretboard - add
color and texture to the standard, man-made 12-tone scale used in
contemporary music. Some of these microtones are actually in tune with
the harmonic series, the naturally occurring series of notes on which
the 12-tone scale is based. While those notes would actually sound
harmonious if used in chords, the fretboards of standard guitars simply
don't have frets for them. The solution? Add frets.
FreeNote Music has taken a step in
this direction. Through an exclusive deal with G&L Guitars, FreeNote
has created microtonal electric guitars that retain the fretboard's
standard layout but have additional frets that allows guitarists to play
microtones.
Our review guitar was FreeNote's
12-Tone Plus Built upon the G&L S-500 - a guitar that is itself
based on the Fender Stratocaster - the 12-Tone Plus has a swamp ash body
and a hard rock maple neck. Aside from its brilliant blue burst finish,
our guitar's most conspicuous feature was its numerous frets: a total of
19 in the first octave alone.
Since FreeNote assumes a fairly
steep learning curve for most of its audience, the 12-Tone Plus comes
with a detailed and clearly annotated instruction booklet that provides
numerous examples, in notation and tablature, of chords that can be
created on the guitar. The new chords described in the book include the
harmonic 7th (a bluesy flatted minor 7th), the half-minor (a related
minor 3rd) and a double minor chord with two 3rds that creates a unique,
shimmering microtonal effect. The booklet also includes useful
information about the various scales that can be created within the
12-Tone's vast territory.
The real fun began once I left the
booklet behind and ventured off on my own. I soon found that, with a
little effort, I could adjust familiar chords - dominant 9ths (think
James Brown), augmented 9ths (the "Hendrix chord") and all
sorts of demented note clusters from heaven or hell-to work within this
system. In fact, everything I played on the 12-Tone Plus, from
descending power chords to familiar tapped patterns, sounded fresh.
FreeNote also offers the 12-Tone
Ultra Plus, with more harmonic series frets, and other models-including
fretless guitars, 19- and 31-tone equal temperament guitars and 62-tone
just intonation guitars that allow further explorations into the beyond.
These tuning systems are also available on any G&L guitar or bass.
THE BOTTOM LINE
In a world where musicians are
constantly looking for new textures, here's an option for adventurous.
List price starts at $1,595 (with
hardshell case)
FreeNote Music; 2350 Broadway,
Suite 240, New York, NY 10024; (212) 580-0602 or email freenote@earthlink.net