Tuning, Timbre, Spectrum, Scale

Tuning, Timbre, Spectrum, Scale focuses on perceptions ofconsonance and dissonance, and how these are dependent on timbre. This alsorelates to musical scale: certain timbres sound more consonant in some scalesthan others. Sensory consonance and the ability to measure it have importantimplications for the design of audio devices and for musical theory andanalysis. Applications include methods of adapting sounds for arbitrary scales,ways to specify scales for nonharmonic sounds, and techniques of soundmanipulation based on maximizing (or minimizing) consonance. Specialconsideration is given here to a new method of adaptive tuning that canautomatically adjust the tuning of a piece based its timbral character so as tominimize dissonance. Audio examples illustrating the ideas presented areprovided for free on the Springer Extras website (http://extras.springer.com). Thisunique analysis of sound and scale will be of interest to physicists andengineers working in acoustics, as well as to musicians and psychologists

Zusammenfassung
Table2. 2. Each note consists of three partials. If the sequence is played ascending, then the ?rst virtual pitch tends to be perceived, whereas if played descending, the second, lower virtual pitch tends to be heard. Only one virtual pitch is audible at a time. This can be heard in sound examples [S: 6] and [S: 7]. Note First Second Third Virtual Pitch Virtual Pitch partial partial partial ascending descending 1 600 800 1000 200. 0 158. 9 2 620 820 1020 205. 2 163. 0 3 640 840 1040 210. 4 167. 1 4 660 860 1060 215. 6 171. 2 5 680 880 1080 220. 9 175. 3 6 700 900 1100 226. 1 179. 4 7 720 920 1120 231. 3 183. 6 8 740 940 1140 236. 6 187. 7 9 760 960 1160 241. 8 191. 8 10 780 980 1180 247. 0 195. 9 11 800 1000 1200 252. 2 200. 0 Pitch and virtual pitch are properties of a single sound. For instance, a chord played by the violin, viola, and cello of a string quartet is not usually thoughtofashavingapitch;rather,pitchisassociatedwitheachinstrumental tone separately. Thus, determining the pitch or pitches of a complex sound source requires that it ?rst be partitioned into separate perceptual entities. Only when a cluster of partials fuse into a single sound can it be assigned a pitch. When listening analytically, for instance, there may be more notes presentthaninthesamesoundwhenlisteningholistically.

Inhalt
The Octave Is Dead Long Live the Octave.- The Science of Sound.- Sound on Sound.- Musical Scales.- Consonance and Dissonance of Harmonic Sounds.- Related Spectra and Scales.- A Bell, A Rock, A Crystal.- Adaptive Tunings.- A Wing, An Anomaly, A Recollection.- The Gamelan.- Consonance-Based Musical Analysis.- From Tuning to Spectrum.- Spectral Mappings.- A Music Theory for 10-tet.- Classical Music of Thailand and 7-tet.- Speculation, Correlation, Interpretation, Conclusion.