Just intonation

Just intonation is any musical tuning in which the frequencies of notes are related by whole number ratios. Any interval tuned in this way is called a just interval; in other words, the two notes are members of the same harmonic series. Although in theory two notes tuned in the frequency ratio 1024:927 might be said to be justly tuned, in practice only ratios using quite small numbers tend to be called just. Intervals used are then capable of being more consonant.

Non-western tuning

In Indian music, the basic unaltered diatonic scale is considered to be

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1/1, 9/8, 5/4, 4/3, 3/2, 27/16, 15/8, 2/1.

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This would appear problematic, since (27/16):(5/4) = 27:20 (a wolf interval), not 4:3. But Indian music uses melodies over a drone dyad (usually 1/1 and 3/2), so these two pitches (27/16 and 5/4) would seldom be heard sounding together. See sargam and swara.

Related Topics:
Sargam - Swara

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