Questions tagged [pitch]
Use this tag whenever the topic involved relative or absolute tones. It can be the frequency of a note, or perhaps the comparison of a tuned instrument vs an untuned one.
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Isn’t perceiving pitches as consonant (simple ratios) and dissonant (complex ratios) to one another simply a choice?
I’ve been thinking a little deeper into how sound is produced. The conclusion I’ve come to at the moment is that the simplest way to define sound is motion of matter (gas, water, solids) over time. So,...
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Isn’t pitch memorization almost as valuable as absolute pitch?
I think a high majority of people are capable of singing songs in the original key and singing the correct notes. Taking it a step further, wouldn’t paying attention to the name of notes that we ...
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Can two songs share the same melodic notes but still have distinct melodies?
This may sound like quite an obvious question. Admittedly my knowledge of music theory is limited.
I'm essentially wondering if two songs can use the exact same notes while still having original ...
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Are percussion instruments the only instrument type capable of making an unpitched (indefinite) sound? [Electronic instruments excluded]
I just want to confirm,
wind instruments and stringed instruments are completely incapable of creating an unpitched sound correct?
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Does rhythm create pitch? [closed]
You see, rhythm and pitch are exactly the same thing, only at very
different speeds.
https://dantepfer.com/blog/?p=277
Every pitch can be interpreted as a (very fast) rhythm, but the only
rhythms ...
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What acoustic instruments are great for Droning? [closed]
I want a drone, using only acoustic instruments, with as little effort as possible, to accompany singing.
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Is there any official standard document that says middle C is C4? [duplicate]
You can find people on the Internet talking about "Scientific pitch notation (SPN), also known as American standard pitch notation (ASPN) and international pitch notation (IPN)", like on ...
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Why is there a debate over whether or not percussion instruments are pitched?
Here is an excerpt from Introduction to the Study of Musical Scales by Alain Danielou.
The important part is in bold. I included the rest of the passage only to provide context:
It is the loss of ...
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Purpose of ascending and descending scales?
I understand that ascending scales go from a lower pitch class up to the next pitch class with the same letter name. For example, C to C'. For descending scales it is the reverse.
What I don't get is ...
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Typical pitch interval of the exclamation "uh-oh!" [closed]
When one encounters a problem, one might exclaim "uh-oh!" What is the typical pitch interval between "uh" and "oh"?
The absolute pitches of "uh" and "oh&...
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Am I hearing overtones or beats? is it normal to hear them?
I started learning piano not so long ago and there is something that's confusing me a lot: when I play some notes at the same time (chords or two notes) sometimes I hear a second higher vibrating ...
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Why are high notes easier to sing in tune?
I'm not sure that this is a universal phenomenon but even if it's not - what could be the reason that for many people it's easier to hit a stable pitch in their higher register?
Edit:
To be clear, in ...
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A melody is built from both notes and chords
A web site reads :
The difference between notes and chords is that a note is a single
pitch (for example C). ... This is important in music theory because a
note will have no characteristic when ...
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Pitch and Hearing beginner question
I'm a total newbie. And I'll pretend there are no black notes so it is easier for me to explain.
CDEFGABḈḊ (where Ḉ and Ḋ are one octave above C and D)
When a Musician says, "oh, C and Ḉ are the ...
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If I have a combination of pitches played as a chord in a MIDI, how do I extract only two pitches from it and get somewhat similar tone?
While extracting pitches in a MIDI file of piano instrument, I get chords with combination of pitches as D2.D3.D4.F#4.A4 played for 0.2 duration. However, I want to receive only a maximum of 2 pitches ...
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calculating midi pitch bend value from key numbers with fractional part
I am creating a tool for composing with midi micro-tonal message (pitch bend), and I wanted make sure I am calculating the amount of bending correctly. I would appreciate it if any one could tell me ...
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Do People and/or Robots Speak on Pitch and in Harmony with themselves?
I asked this in Linguistics, but apparently nobody there wants to venture an answer; maybe this is a better place to ask it.
My ear is not good enough to tell via observation whether people speak in ...
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What is the reason a given note can have different "sounds"
People, instruments, objects, etc. all are capable of producing "sounds" that sound different (not sure the proper term for this) but can produce the same note.
Given that sound can be ...
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What determines a Note?
In the context of guitar for example:
if I press down on string 6 fret 3 and play that string, that note is a G.
if I play the open string 3 that note is a G
if I press down on string 1 fret 3 and ...
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Are there languages/cultures which use a different mental framing of note pitch than "low/high"?
It occurred to me recently that the way we refer to the pitch of notes is somewhat arbitrary. We refer to notes with a low frequency as "low" and notes with a high frequency as "high.&...
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How to improve what I am doing, thanks! [closed]
Am I out of tune? A little fast or a little slow? It’s original female song. I need more objective opinions from different people, not from someone know me well.
Thank you!!!
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Viol Tuning lowest note
Are there any instruments of the viol family that can reach C1 in pitch? I have tried searching it up online but I can't find any results.
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Learning to sing: Some songs i can sing straightforwardly other i really cant is this normal?
I've been learning to sing for a year. And I noticed some great improvements but there is one thing that happens to me that is totally strange: When I listen to songs, there are songs that I can "...
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Notes underneath the bar line [duplicate]
I am new to sheet music and.I get the notes in the lines and on the lines. But when the notes go above or below the line I have a hard time with reading it and identify were the notes corresponded to ...
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Apparent upward drift in pitch of "Mellow Piano" keytones on Roland HP 704
When I strike and hold any one of keys E4-G4 on my new Roland HP 704 in "Mellow Piano" setting, I hear an apparent upward drift in pitch of a semitone. When two adjacent keys are struck &...
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Portamento in the Scream Tracker
I am designing the implementation of the Scream Tracker 2 using Midi math. Everything matched perfect so far, until I considered "portamento". In the sci-pop articles there's no much ...
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The relation between making a note from "pitch & duration" and "name & octave"
This question might need some computer science information as well, but I'm stuck in the music theory side of it: I'm trying to use a library in Python (the programming language) called Mingus that ...
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How is learning Fixed DO Solfege any different than learning Absolute Pitch?
In Fixed DO Solfege, you are essentially memorizing the pitch in association with the pitch's name. From what I can understand, you can hear any note without establishing a tonal center as in you can ...
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How is the starting pitch chosen/remembered for music sung in Abenaki culture?
I'm learning to sing and teach to children several Abenaki songs. I was careful to be authentic in sourcing them, and am working through a book and audio recordings prepared by a Penobscot elder and ...
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How to route midi to mauto pitch to control notes in audio
I want to add mauto pitch to an audio sample and then route midi information to mauto pitch for it to adjust the notes in the audio to, like in this video:
but with fl ...
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When could humans first measure pitch accurately?
This article suggests that accurate measurement of pitch wasn't possible until around 1870. Another source suggested that is was possible around the time of J.S. Bach. Does anyone have more info on ...
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is there an instrument that plays all notes for the same volume profile (over time) regardless of pitch
So you know how when playing a stringed instrument a low note will always play longer than a high note.
Here is a good question about it - When we press a piano key, why does a high pitch note not run ...
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What is the importance of the accompaniments for singers?
Why singing teachers says you must sing or practice a song with accompaniments or backing track (karaoke) ? I don't understand what is the point of singing with accompaniments, when i asked my teacher ...
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Singing in electronic music
In most of electronic and synth-pop music the accompaniments are played in very high or very low octaves that the voice couldn't match, so how the singers in this genres sing in tune without any ...
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How do I make sure I'm hitting the right notes when I sing?
I'm a beginner. I think I will get a new vocal coach since my current vocal coach is ineffective and doesn't help me at all. I asked my question on reddit and asked a singer I know, my question is: ...
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What is the point of notes lower than human hearing
(Scientific pitch notation)
For example:
Organs can go down to C-1
Hyperbass Flute goes down to C0
And these notes have neglegible overtones on these instruments!
Do they modulate other notes?
They ...
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If a whole tone is a 9:8 ratio, and a major third is a 5:4 ratio, and a major third is two whole tones, then why (9/8)^2 != 5/4?
If a whole tone is a 9:8 ratio between frequencies, and a major third is a 5:4 ratio between frequencies, and a major third is two whole tones, then to replicate two whole tones, wouldn't one just ...
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Help understanding frequency ratios and string length
This music book I'm reading taught me about frequency ratios as the basis for scales, but it doesn't explain it well enough for me, so I'm trying to learn more about it on my own. I want to know how ...
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Why can I remember this pitch? [duplicate]
I don't have perfect pitch, first of all. However I've realized that for some reason the first note of the song linked below ("Brite Boy" by Alex G) has taken root in my memory such that ...
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Understanding terminology relating to the formula for the relationship between length of a string and its pitch
I am teaching mathematics, and I don't have any background in music. There is a cool example in the textbook that is related to the violin. There are a couple of technical words in that problem that I ...
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How to sort for pitch similarity?
In a question at Mathoverflow, I asked about how to measure the similarity of two musical notes:
https://mathoverflow.net/questions/404259/how-to-measure-perceived-note-similarity-in-music-simplicity-...
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How do unpitched instruments work on a technical aspect? [duplicate]
I dont know a lot about how sound waves work, so this question might sound stupid, but as far as I know the frequency determines the pitch and the amplitude determines the volume.
What confuses me is ...
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Is there a word for being able to sing a song in a different key/pitch without practice?
Example: Say you randomly want to sing Toxic by Britney Spears out loud, but you sing it in a lower key or pitch(idk the terminology) you've never practiced the song this way, heck you're not even a ...
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Lyrical Contralto vs Dramatic Mezzo-soprano
I'm a self-taught singer who would like to ask about lyrical contralto vs dramatic mezzo-soprano.
The range of my voice is from F3 - F5.
On the upper end, I can sing up to C5 quite comfortably.
(I've ...
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Effect of octave on consonance [duplicate]
Was playing around on a keyboard (Casio WK-245, default St.GrPno tone) and I'm noticing that the same chord moved up an octave feels quite different. When I play Cmaj7(no inversions: C,E,G,B in that ...
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How do I pitch shift a song so that sounds in tune with instruments tuned to 440 Hz?
I have an MP3 file of a specific song where the instruments are not tuned to 440 Hz. When you play along to this song with a 440-Hz-tuned instrument your playing will sound out of tune.
There is a way ...
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Subjective perception of pitch
I read that the human ear perceives pitch as the logarithm of frequency, so the ear should sense that each note on the scale rises by the same amount. However, to me the higher notes in an octave seem ...
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I have been struggling at achieving pitch accuracy since forever. How can I prevent singing off-pitch?
An audio of myself singing to Billie Eilish's "Bad Guy":
my bad guy cover
I have been singing for a year and 4 months now. When I started I had no knowledge of pitch, tone and dynamics. I ...
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How to find out the pitch of a melody in Ableton live 10?
I have a sample that plays 4 chords. I have no idea what their key/pitch is. I've tried using the tuner audio effect but it doesn't say anything at all. Does anyone know an alternate way to find the ...
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Visualization of Tones being played together
Recently I found this video showing the "visual representation" of sound waves.
I was trying to figure out how these shapes were being generated. I am interested in the parts where there is ...
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