Talk:Harmonic series (music)

This article, and its relative Harmonic, is a right old can of worms. I am hoping not to open it! Well not too much anyway. Oh, and do we have the note pitch indicator conventions somewhere - C and g' and all that??? People (eg me) might like them as a reference. Nevilley 18:59 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)

Helmholtz, in this article, isn't it?? Nevilley 22:41 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)

So I opened it up a little bit, but I think the article really needed to be updated. It was sort of conflating harmonics as applied to timbre with harmonics as a method to reach higher registers. Things like "the fundamental is the note sounding when a string instrument is bowed normally" are not very accurate; there are a lot of harmonics sounding in this event as well. Hopefully the new version is an improvement. Some of the instrumental details might belong more on another page, but I'll let that sort itself out as the populace sees fit. --User:Chinasaur

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Pedal Tones

Continued from User talk:Merphant...

On the trombone, notes below E (below the bass clef) are considered pedal tones, even with an f attachment; the fundamental is usually called 'pedal Bb', though maybe that's all just because it's in that register.

I classified the fundamental with pedal tones because I remembered reading about the physics of brass instruments cancelling out the fundamental. Heh, I wasn't too clear on it myself, so you forced me to pull out the musical acoustics book. Here's a summary of what I learned:

• Cornets, flugelhorns, euphoniums, tubas, etc. are mostly conical; trumpets, trombones, baritone horn, etc are mostly cylindrical. The lips act like a reed, and the mouthpiece end is effectively closed. The bell gives much-needed amplification to the horn, especially for cylindrical brass. The shape of the bell and mouthpiece distort the natural resonant modes of the horn somewhat from those of the pure cone or tube.

• Due to their shape, the conical instuments have the natural modes close to the harmonic series. That's why you can get a good pedal Bb on a flugelhorn.

• Cylindical instruments have natural modes near the odd harmonics, 1, 3, 5, etc. But careful craft of the bell and mouthpiece shift the modes enough that you get a complete harmonic series, but of a different fundamental! The fundamental of the distorted modes is far enough from the natural fundamental to cause problems.

There is a graph showing the higher modes creeping up the instrument, while the fundamental is primarily confined to the cylindical portion. I guess that's why high notes on brass are so much more shrill; they resonate further up the bell.

So, in response to your question, the fundamental is essentially faked, especially on cylindrical brass, and not so much on conical horns. You're right though, it's certainly not as faked as the others. As to the name, I've always thought of all those notes as being in the 'pedal register'.

Does that make sense? It's a tricky subject. I think the article text is essentially correct, if a bit vague. Oh yeah, the source is Donald Hall, Musical Acoustics, 2002. -- Merphant

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spare bit that needs merging:

All sounds of definite pitch can be broken down into a group of individual sine waves at discreet pitches. These pitches are called harmonics, and are found at integer multiples of the lowest pitch (called the fundamental). This rising scale of pitches is called the Harmonic Series

Done. -- Merphant 06:57 12 Jun 2003 (UTC)

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There was a bit that had been edited to read: "The fundamental is called a pedal note or pedal tone and can be faked, but in fact, brass instruments do not play "the harmonic series", check a good book on musical acoustics to find out more about this." I've removed the "but in fact" part - it's really useless, the entire article might as well say "For information about the harmonic series, check a good book on musical acoustics". If somebody can explain this properly, that would be good. --Camembert

Some of this ariticle should be in overtone, I think. -- Anon.

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Some of the info in the pedal tone paragraph isn't exactly correct. Pedal tones are actually quite common in bass trombone literature because a bass trombone using two attachments can completly bridge the gap between the pedals and the 2nd partial. By pedal tones I am not refering to notes below E1 (lowest non pedal note on tenor trombone) but to notes from petal B♭ downwards. Notes between pedal B♭ and E1 when played using triggers are technically just the second partial of a lot of tubing, not a pedal tone. When these notes are faked without a trigger they are sometimes called false tones to differentiate them from true pedal tones. Pedal tones are not "extremely difficult to play" on trombone; I have been able to produce a pedal B♭ on tenor trombone since I was in middle school. What is difficult is making a pedal tone have a good tone quality. False tones, however, which are sometimes called pedals, are much harder to play than pedal tones. I think the wording needs revision. --Hrothgar137

Language - sesquiflats etc

All this "sesquiflat" etc language in the table of harmonic series pitches seems to me to be much more opaque than the previous version which was in plainer English. I do not think it helps the article, in fact I feel it might hinder it, and am wondering about reverting it. Does anyone else have a view please? Nevilley 12:09, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I agree, it is confusing. I don't know about wholesale reversion, but at least linking sesquiflat etc. to a page explaining the terms would be helpful. -- Merphant 23:43, 18 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I also agree. It's best to avoid jargon if possible. I'd change it myself, but I don't know exactly what a sesquiflat is, to be honest (I could have a guess, but I wouldn't be certain). --Camembert

I've seen the term half flat (denoted by a backwards flat symbol) and half sharp (denoted by two horizontal lines and a single vertical line through them (as opposed to two vertical lines in the normal sharp symbol)). Half flat means the note is lowered by a quarter tone as opposed to a semitone for a normal flat. Half sharps raise the note by a quarter tone. Use of these terms might be less confusing than sesquiflat, which I believe is synonymous to half flat (not sure on that one). Wikipedia has an article on quartertones but not on sesquiflats. One should not however, that the out of tune harmonics don't exactly fall on the quartertone scale, so using half flat would be an approximation.--Hrothgar137