4 ms·
> The "in tune" notes are as much a function of culture as physics. Huh? Pitch ratios are not a social construct, it's just arithmetic.
by otabdeveloper4 7mo ago
> The "in tune" notes are as much a function of culture as physics.
Huh? Pitch ratios are not a social construct, it's just arithmetic.
- reverius42 7mo agoAnd the choice of which ratios "sound good" is cultural, to some extent.
- otabdeveloper4 7mo agoNo it isn't. You can hear integer pitch ratios in the same way you can see, e.g., the difference between a square and a rectangle or between a circle and an oval.
- PaulDavisThe1st 7mo agoBut more than 90% of all the written-composed music from western Europe and North America (at minimum) over the last several centuries does not use integer pitch ratios.
- otabdeveloper4 7mo agoYes, that's indeed what the TFA is about.
- khafra 7mo agoThere's definitely some physical underpinnings--most music systems have the concept of an octave which maps nicely onto frequency-doubling, for example. But there's also culture: For a purely Western example, even-tempering is in tune, but you'll hear different "beat patterns" for a given interval than with an instrument tuned for music in just one key.