El armónico 7o
- Place of Publication: Ciudad de México, Mexico
- Language: Spanish
- Date of Publication: 1925
- Editors: Gerónimo Baqueiro Foster & Vicente T. Mendoza
- Type: Citation Only
- Prepared by: Natalia Vilchis
El Armónico 7° [RIPM code ELA] was published in Mexico City in 1925 under the direction of Gerónimo Baqueiro Foster and was closely linked to the activities of Grupo Trece, a collective formed by students and composers in Mexico City, devoted to the dissemination of Julián Carrillo’s musical theories. Three issues from that year—January, February, and March—are preserved in RIPM. Each issue comprises approximately eighteen pages and centers on the promotion, explanation, and practical application of “El Sonido 13,” Carrillo’s system based on microtonal divisions that extend beyond the traditional twelve-tone scale of Western music. El Armónico 7° provides further contemporaneous documentation of Carrillo’s ideas, separate from his own journal El Sonido 13, through the perspective of the Mexican musical avant-garde movement and its efforts to rethink the fundamental materials of music during the mid-1920s.
The journal opens with an editorial article and continues with reports on concerts and initiatives organized by Grupo Trece, as well as reviews of performances by Mexican musicians experimenting with Carrillo’s system. Several articles adopt a pedagogical approach, addressing the division of the musical scale into smaller intervals, the theoretical foundations of microtonality, and the implications of El Sonido 13 for composition and improvisation. These texts often present Carrillo’s ideas as a radical expansion of musical language, emphasizing precision of pitch and the expressive possibilities of new intervallic relationships. Additional sections include short notices on musical activity in Mexico and abroad.
This RIPM Index was produced from a copy of the journal held by the Centro Nacional de Investigación, Documentación e Información Musical Carlos Chávez (Cenidim) in Mexico City.