source file: mills2.txt Date: Wed, 19 Feb 1997 07:43:27 -0800 Subject: Kopie von: can anyone explain these "ghosttones"? From: Daniel Wolf -Betreff:Kopie von: can anyone explain these "ghosttones"? Gary Morrison wrote: '' That's kind of like saying "numbers like 2, 3, and 3738239.7564108". Bells are a totally different matter entirely from flutes, oboes, or other woodwinds and strings. True, none of them have mathematically exact integer multiple partials, but bells are many many times further from harmonic than woodwinds and strings. '' While the absolute deviation from the interger series is greater in bells than in woodwinds, the smaller absolute deviations actually encountered in woodwinds are - as equations - no less complex. Gary's observations that synthetic instrumental sounds with integer harmonic spectra are satisfactory substitutes does illustrate how other aspects of sound - particularly the envelope - may be equally or more critical to our recognition of a sound. Since I was around at the start of this discussion, let me reiterate that while I find the integer series to be the best available model, real instruments do deviate from this model (some more than others) and that it might be _useful_ to a composer to investigate the deviations. The claim that another model is more correct - Mr. Lucy's - would need to be supported in a way that decisively demonstrates an advantage over the integer model. He has been unable to do this and, I suspect, has in fact misunderstood why his tuning might provide certain attractions. At the moment, the difference tone sequences of Erv Wilson provide a more convincing rationale for this entire family of tunings, of which Lucy's is but one in an indefinite number. Beating frequencies are indeed an interesting line of research, particularly in the psychoacoutical domain, but the best way of going about this work is not to start with a single model - i.e. Harrison - and try to prove its superiority but to try to define the advantages of particular beating rates and then determine the tunings that best support these rates in a musical context. The Harrison tuning might just happen to turn up somewhere in such a study, but I would not hazard a bet on it! Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Wed, 19 Feb 1997 16:50 +0100 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA11663; Wed, 19 Feb 1997 16:50:32 +0100 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA11657 Received: from by ella.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) id HAA24253; Wed, 19 Feb 1997 07:47:50 -0800 Date: Wed, 19 Feb 1997 07:47:50 -0800 Message-Id: <009B020C5D2F250B.3038@vbv40.ezh.nl> Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@ella.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@ella.mills.edu