Editing Enharmonic scale (section)

==Bracketing tetrachords==
Four of the scale notes – the [[tonic (music)|tonic]] ({{sc|'''C'''}} in the example), [[subdominant]] ({{sc|'''F'''}}), [[dominant (music)|dominant]] ({{sc|'''G'''}} ), and [[octave]] ({{sc|'''c′<nowiki/>'''}}) – are all fixed: They are nearly exactly the same [[relative pitch]]es in all three categories of ancient Greek scales ('''''enharmonic''''', [[chromatic genus|''chromatic'']], and [[diatonic genus|''diatonic'']]),<ref name=ML-West-1992/> and in ancient Greek music, the fixed tones [[relative pitch]]es were very nearly the same as the corresponding notes in the modern [[12 equal temperament|conventional scale]]. On the other hand, the four notes contained between the brackets, from the example {{sc|'''D'''}} and {{sc|'''E'''}} (between {{sc|'''C'''}} and {{sc|'''F'''}}); and {{sc|'''A'''}} and {{sc|'''B'''}} (between {{sc|'''G'''}} and {{sc|'''c′<nowiki/>'''}}) are the two pairs of bracketed, variable notes; they can have nearly any pitch. After pitches chosen for them, if the interval between a movable note and any other note is about a quarter tone or less, the scale is called "enharmonic". The small, or "[[microtonal]]" interval can be between either of the bracketing fixed notes, or from the other movable note, inside the bracket.

Despite the music of [[India]] and the [[Middle East]] still using similar intervals in traditional and classical scales, even the idea of the very small pitch intervals used in the enharmonic scale has lain outside the competence of musicians trained in occidental music at least since the time of the early Roman Empire.<ref name=ML-West-1992/>