https://asturaphoenix.github.io/Harmonics/
Demonstrates how an affinity for periodic sound influences our choices of scale systems in music. This is an old demonstration from high school, ported to a web app.
This web app uses the Web Audio API for playback and Bootstrap/jQuery for layout and scripting.
Original blog post follows for posterity. Features of the web app may differ.
Sun, 23 Jul 2006 00:18:08 -04:00
The question I asked two days ago while conversing with Nathaniel was "Why do we use a twelve tone scale?"
The hypothesis: a twelve tone scale shows a high degree of conformity with a harmonic series while individual tones are at convenient intervals.
I'd like to do a bit more with the applet, but you can at least try a few numbers. I would suggest going from 1 to 24, observing how those numbers line up with harmonics. Clicking on the table will play the harmonic note and closest scale note simultaneously, so you can see how close they are. (But cover your ears when the number's red!) And if they get too high for your liking, double-clicking on any frequency will let you enter a new frequency, and the harmonic series will be adjusted accordingly. Have fun =D! No, seriously!
>EDIT: New features/activities:
Try selecting multiple harmonics and changing the settings. Hear how all the harmonics sound with "Play Harmonic Pitch" only, and then how the related chords sound with "Play Scale Pitch" only. Hear chords in different scales. Try selecting ALL the harmonics! Change the number of tones in the scale and hear how the different approximations of the harmonic series sound. Toggle the even harmonics on and off, and notice how it changes the sound.
I tell you, I think it provides a novel perspective on music to find that all the chords you thought sounded so wonderful in a 12-tone scale are actually imperfect.
>EDIT: Another hypothesis:
Maybe the reason our 12-tone scale sounds tolerable is that in real life when you play a chord, the instrument undergoes sympathetic vibration at the harmonics.
>EDIT
Even without sympathetic vibration, any single note played by any given instrument is itself made of a harmonic series, so the overtones are always there, mingling with the chord tones, imperfect but close.