We have scales but why??

[whyterabbyt]

Also, i could speak clearly when i was an infant

really?

The term infant is typically applied to young children between the ages of 1 month and 12 months;

precocious then. how was your knowledge of grammar and linguistics

unless of course you just picked me out to start an argument and try to get me banned, now wheres that ignore button

Bye then. That solution's gotta be easier than seeing someone counter sweeping (and innacurate) generalisations, I guess.

[Sendy]

The Western (12-tone equal temperament) scale is an approximation or comporomise of a system built from the ground up on accoustic (and mathematical) principles. It evolved over a very long time, and much of the details are something I only have a little knowledge in. The big clue is the major chord present in the (ideal) harmonics of all (tonal) instruments.

It's a comporomise because really there should be more notes, but many were deemed so close in pitch as to be indistinguishable from eachother. This also has a cost and practicality factor. If you've ever seen a microtonal organ they have keys up the wazoo.

As to the phenomenon of home keys or tonics, not all music follows this trend. It's a very powerful musical device, and may go back (my speculation) to the days when melodies were sung over a tonic drone (a drone which may have become internalized, giving weight to the effect), but a musical device nontheless which composers can choose to utilize or not.

[Trakstar]

n infant (from the Latin word infans, meaning "unable to speak" or "speechless") is the very young offspring of a human or other mammal. When applied to humans, the term is usually considered synonymous with baby, but the latter is commonly applied to the young of any animal. When a human child learns to walk, the term toddler may be used instead.
The term infant is typically applied to young children between the ages of 1 month and 12 months; however, definitions vary between birth and 3 years of age

definitions vary "between birth and 3 years of age"

[whyterabbyt]

dcjfdkig djkelfnv eyfmgkz f iutv ;o\linc o eh 9wHC9 VY EUVN9ET7

A post without the scale of spelling or words that mean anything

Makes "If this is a serious post,(which i am starting to doubt)" somewhat ironic.

[dalor]

The way that I understand scales, I think of a picture to paint. The color palette I choose for the painting is equivalent to music scales. You wouldn't paint the sun green, or grass red, unless you intend to and then make somehow clear by other elements in the picture to identify these wrong colored elements for what they are or intent to be. Just my 2C.

Could you explain how using green paint to colour a realistic representation of a green thing equates to calling a note that's approximately 525Hz 'C' because its approximately 1.9 times the frequency of a note you've decided to call 'A' ?

In my very own theory book, red would be represented by an interval of these frequencies. (eg red is c, d#, g and all transpositions anywhere in the frequency spectrum of these), or any other scale for that matter.

[Trakstar]

dcjfdkig djkelfnv eyfmgkz f iutv ;o\linc o eh 9wHC9 VY EUVN9ET7

A post without the scale of spelling or words that mean anything

Makes "If this is a serious post,(which i am starting to doubt)" somewhat ironic.

Quote:
Its like learning a language, without understanding what words are what and things like pronunciation and grammar, we would be no better than animals uttering grunts and snorts that are completely unintelligible.

"quote"
And yet children manage to speak without understanding what words are, or things like pronunciation and grammar.

Actually, by empirical observation, most people seem to manage to speak without understanding grammar, and write without understanding punctuation...



Yes, very ironic,

[Trakstar]

The way that I understand scales, I think of a picture to paint. The color palette I choose for the painting is equivalent to music scales. You wouldn't paint the sun green, or grass red, unless you intend to and then make somehow clear by other elements in the picture to identify these wrong colored elements for what they are or intent to be. Just my 2C.

Could you explain how using green paint to colour a realistic representation of a green thing equates to calling a note that's approximately 525Hz 'C' because its approximately 1.9 times the frequency of a note you've decided to call 'A' ?

In my very own theory book, red would be represented by an interval of these frequencies. (eg red is c, d#, g and all transpositions anywhere in the frequency spectrum of these), or any other scale for that matter.

Why waste your breath

[whyterabbyt]

http://thinkzone.wlonk.com/Music/12Tone.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_scale

If this is a serious post,(which i am starting to doubt) check this out for some lite reading

Are you of the impression that the only people who might disagree with you know less than you do?

Do you even think those links contradict what I said in my post? If so, feel free to enumerate how.

[Trakstar]

http://thinkzone.wlonk.com/Music/12Tone.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Musical_scale

If this is a serious post,(which i am starting to doubt) check this out for some lite reading

Are you of the impression that the only people who might disagree with you know less than you do?

Do you even think those links contradict what I said in my post? If so, feel free to enumerate how.

It was for the OP, but it looks like i am in the wrong forum. Its over to you.
You are right, I am wrong, you win, I surrender, sorry i spoke

[Echoes in the Attic]

It is simply mathematical ratios. The intervals that we know of in western culture come from these well known ratios and the discovery that we seem to enjoy them. For example an octave difference is a doubling of the frequency, so the ratio is 2:1, a very simple ratio. The more simple, the more "right" they sound together, or consonant. Octaves always fit with each other as they double the frequencies, so we know of them as the same notes, higher or lower on our scales. A perfect fifth (7 semi-tones) is a ratio of 3:2, so this sounds very fitting to us as well, a major third (4 semi-tones) is 5:4, a major second (2 semi-tones) is 9:8 etc. When you start to get into ratios that do not make use of these simple ratios, our brains see it as dissonant and not so nice.

So we tend to like these mathematically rounded ratios, it somehow appeals to our brains. Not that we don't enjoy some detuning, but the overall ratios that we perceive in music using these scales are still these simple ratios.

Although not all cultures use the same sets of ratios the same way, many cultures us many of these same ratios in their scales.

[whyterabbyt]

dcjfdkig djkelfnv eyfmgkz f iutv ;o\linc o eh 9wHC9 VY EUVN9ET7

A post without the scale of spelling or words that mean anything

Makes "If this is a serious post,(which i am starting to doubt)" somewhat ironic.

Quote:
Its like learning a language, without understanding what words are what and things like pronunciation and grammar, we would be no better than animals uttering grunts and snorts that are completely unintelligible.

"quote"
And yet children manage to speak without understanding what words are, or things like pronunciation and grammar.

Actually, by empirical observation, most people seem to manage to speak without understanding grammar, and write without understanding punctuation...



Yes, very ironic,

You're starting to lose coherency. Are you still trying to insist that to learn a language one has to 'understand what words are' and understand grammar ?

[whyterabbyt]

In my very own theory book, red would be represented by an interval of these frequencies. (eg red is c, d#, g and all transpositions anywhere in the frequency spectrum of these), or any other scale for that matter.

Why would there be a need for red to be 'represented' by something when the paint and the thing being painted are already red?

[dalor]

I think I know where wr comes from. He thinks absolute frequencies in music.
It's not how the brain works. Absolute frequencies mean nothing to us.
The brain is a big pattern-searching machine and needs at least a minimum of 2 frequencies for it to have meaning. The distance between those, this is information the brain uses.

[whyterabbyt]

I think I know where wr comes from. He thinks absolute frequencies in music.

Bingo... you're completely


...well, erm, wrong. You clearly dont have a clue where Im coming from, whatever that you actually think that is. I mean, what the hell do you actually mean by 'He thinks absolute frequencies in music' ??

But, please feel free to explain how my assertion that scales are an arbitrary system for describing frequency ratios between arbitrarily-chosen frequencies has anything to to with 'absolute frequencies'.

You do know what 'arbitrary' means dont you?

[dalor]

You have a great day here too, Kay?