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Tuning, Timbre, Spectrum, Scale

  • Book
  • © 2005

Overview

Authors:
  1. William A. Sethares

    1. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison, USA

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  • A unique analysis of the relationship between the structure of sound and the structure of musical scales

  • A very wide range of instruments is analysed - from existing instruments, electronic instruments, artificial sounds and the sounds and scales on non-western instruments

  • Contains the only such analysis of Indonesian instruments

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Table of contents (16 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages I-XVIII
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  2. The Octave Is Dead … Long Live the Octave

    Pages 1-10

  3. The Science of Sound

    Pages 11-38

  4. Sound on Sound

    Pages 39-50

  5. Musical Scales

    Pages 51-76

  6. Consonance and Dissonance of Harmonic Sounds

    Pages 77-95

  7. Related Spectra and Scales

    Pages 97-130

  8. A Bell, A Rock, A Crystal

    Pages 131-153

  9. Adaptive Tunings

    Pages 155-178

  10. A Wing, An Anomaly, A Recollection

    Pages 179-198

  11. The Gamelan

    Pages 199-220

  12. Consonance-Based Musical Analysis

    Pages 221-243

  13. From Tuning to Spectrum

    Pages 245-266

  14. Spectral Mappings

    Pages 267-290

  15. A “Music Theory” for 10-tet

    Pages 291-302

  16. Classical Music of Thailand and 7-tet

    Pages 303-316

  17. Speculation, Correlation, Interpretation, Conclusion

    Pages 317-325

  18. Back Matter

    Pages 327-426
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Keywords

About this book

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
 


Authors and Affiliations

  • Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison, USA

    William A. Sethares

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