[Dixielandjazz] Permutations

[Richard Broadie]

Didn't Steve Allen write at least 1,853,020,000,000,000 songs?   Dick B
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jerry Gordon" <jerrygordon at juno.com>
To: <jazzboard at hotmail.com>
Cc: <dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 30, 2005 4:44 PM
Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Permutations


> "Crotchet" (as used by Bob) means "quarter note." I get a different
> answer than he got, but I don't know how he did his math.
> 
> 4 measures of quarter-notes, assuming 4/4 time and only 8 possible notes
> or a rest, means there are 9-to-the-16th-power possible combinations.
> This is 1.85302E15, or, for those not familiar with scientific notation,
> 1,853,020,000,000,000, which is significantly smaller than Bob's answer
> (but still over 7 million years, at one per second). 
> 
> This does not include the rhythmic variations that Bill asked about, nor
> does it include other time signatures, nor any notes beyond the basic 8.
> I don't think we're going to run out of tunes soon.
> 
> (As an aside, if we consider 8th notes (semi-crotchets?), then the same 4
> measures of 4/4 time yields 9-to-the-32nd-power possible combinations,
> which has 15 more zeroes than the number above! And we stil haven't
> considered other time signatures or any notes beyond the basic 8, or any
> notes other than 1/4, 1/8 and rests.)
> 
> Jerry "how high can you count" Gordon
> 
> 
> On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 21:47:07 +0000 "Bill Gunter" <jazzboard at hotmail.com>
> writes:
>> Hi Robert,
>> 
>> >If you compose four bars each consisting of four straight 
>> crotchets, then 
>> >there are 184,884,250,000,000,000 possible tunes that can be written,
> so 
>> I think 
>> >it'll be some time before all tunes have been composed.
>> 
>> I'm not familiar with the term "crotchet" used in this context. Can 
>> you 
>> explain that a little.
>> 
>> Do your calculations also include the variations of a melody when 
>> you 
>> include rhythmic variations?
> 
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