ENUMERATION

There are 462 heptatonic scales (per key)!

Dr. Alan Burns, University of Leeds, and Tom Metcalfe were preparing an academic journal article titled 'Classification and Enumeration of Heptatonic Scales'.

Sadly, Alan passed away before publication. Dr. Phil Brissenden, University of Salford, is assisting to get it posthumously published.

The paper expands on the work of Barbour (1928, 1936) and is an interdisciplinary study on the mathematics of heptatonic scales. The other pages on this website organise these results into a coherent and consistent pedagogy for practicing musicians.

You can download a draft of the paper here:

Dr. Alan Burns (1959-2021)

Associate Professor in the School of Chemical and Process Engineering,

University of Leeds

"He was a great scholar and the school, and more widely across the University, will not be the same with him gone. He will be remembered for his selfless and caring attitude and never turning away anyone who was in need of help."

Obituary

ENUMERATION

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