Today is a year since George Secor passed on at 76 years of age, what a great opportunity to look back on his visit to EMEAPP back in 2018.

Yes, he was a focused and precise musician and mathematician, his academic work led him to discover the microtonal miracle temperament and even have a microtonal interval named after him. But face to face, George was a jovial and kind individual who really enjoyed the excitement of composing and performing music on unique instruments.

He was an accordionist, but he favored the Moschino Free Bass instruments rather than the traditional type. This allowed him more flexibility in chord structure and allowed for more comprehensive musical figures.

Secor also developed a musical notation system that allowed for the limitless microtonal script, you can see the basis of this at http://sagittal.org/. You can also see the symbols utilized in Sagittal as well as assigned pitches and more at http://sagittal.org/Sagittal-SMuFL-Map.pdf.

But for us, the payoff was time spent with George on our vintage Motorola Scalatron, a synthesizer that allows the user to “play between the cracks” of the standard western 12-note octave. In fact, it is capable of dividing an octave into 1,056 notes!

When George passed, he graciously donated his personal Motorola Scalatron to EMEAPP knowing that it will be viewed and used by many for generations, rather then ending up in a dumpster in Southern Illinois (this almost happened!).

It was our honor to present George with a posthumous EMEAPPP Lifetime Achievement Award in late 2020 to acknowledge his efforts in the world of microtonal research, scale design and notation.

Enjoy this video and take some time to research George and all of his musical doings. He was a great family man and we are proud to have had the opportunity to spend some quality time with him.

Happy trails, George!