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By Lesley Mahoney

July 8, 2013

Guitar professor David Fiuczynski directs Berklee’s Planet MicroJam Institute, which engages in the study of microtonal harmonies that go beyond the 12-tone Western chromatic scale and uses these to create a new musical language. The idea, Fiuczynski says, is to create music that “sounds like a Gauguin painting—a raw, powerful, and extremely colorful mix of Eastern and Western elements.

With Berklee’s robust international student population, a large proportion of which brings a non-Western music background, the college is fertile ground for exploring and experimenting with microtonal harmonies and mixing them with other sounds.

In this episode of Inside Berklee, Fiuczynski talks about this musical system that captures notes that don’t fall within the 12-tone scale and how Berklee is poised to shape a new frontier.

Produced by Lesley Mahoney

Engineered and edited by Berklee student Ryan Walsh