Unison/Octaves, what's the difference?

[Count_fuzzball]

Could someone briefly explain to me what the difference between instruments playing in Unison vs playing octaves?

[aciddose]

there is none. unison can mean to play the same pitch, while octaves is more specific about playing octaves apart. they're the same thing though. multiple instruments playing the same note - if you've got a bass and a flute for example it isn't practical to play the same pitch, but to unison across several octaves instead.

[Ogg Vorbis]

Could someone briefly explain to me what the difference between instruments playing in Unison vs playing octaves?

I have noticed two senses that musicians talk about unison versus playing in octaves:

1) In the strictest sense, unison is performing the same pitches in the same octave. So that would be a clarinet and a flute both playing A3 B3 C3.

2) When there is a melodic line duplicated at the octave or at multiples octave, sometimes it is referred to as a "unison line" which is a looser sense of the term.

Hope this helps...

[Count_fuzzball]

Oh cool, thanks for clearing that up! I was a tad confused about the difference between them!