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An interesting read on natural tuning a=440 vs a=432.
Most of the world now uses 440 Hz as the standard pitch tuning. However, this has been a relatively recent standard, and 432 Hz is making a comeback. Lynda Arnold explores why with sound examples.
Music Theory: Exploring The 432Hz Tuning Debate : Ask.Audio
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02-14-2016 10:05 AM
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Thanks, very cool!
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I find playing in 432 quite cathartic.
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So, the pitches are all different frequencies or whatever anyway, right? I guess I don't understand. How does changing all pitches by an arbitrary amount make "everything" so different?
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It's BS.
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Be careful. There is more wrong information published on this subject than there is intelligent analysis--especially in the so-called 'proofs' that 432 is better. While 432 may be better in some ways, I have never read anything that explained it correctly. For example, 432 is not the frequency of the earth, not the frequency of water, not the frequency of crystals, it is absolutely not many things that people claim it is.
Just one example to show the silly evidence that people give. I saw a video where they took a metal plate, sprinkled sand on it, and excited the plate with a 432Hz vibration, and the sand made a beautiful pattern in reaction to the vibration. The problem is this. If they had used a slightly thicker metal plate, they could have got the exact same pattern with a higher frequency, for example 440. What they were testing is the plate, not the frequency.
I'm just saying that most people who are espousing 432Hz have no idea why, and the whys they come up with are sometimes ridiculous.
Before believing any extraordinary claims, look for actual scientists who understand music the acoustic principles involved.
The psychology of it is another story, a personal matter. If you like, you like it. If it makes it makes no difference to you subjectively, then it makes no difference to you subjectively. If you did a blind test with listeners who did not know what you were testing, the results would depend more on the music itself rather than the reference pitch.
I'm not saying there's nothing to it, but there is a lot of misinformation out there.
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entrust music to the scientists??!!! now thats some post modern thinking right there!!! haha
Originally Posted by kenbennett
cheersLast edited by neatomic; 02-14-2016 at 08:31 PM.
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Nailed it. Originally Posted by Endorphins
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It's trinity in the middle of the number 42.
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You missed my point. Do whatever you like. Just don't believe most of the reasons people give for liking it. Originally Posted by neatomic
In other words, if you are going to try to convince somebody else, then don't just use any ole youtube video to prove it. There are people, scientifically minded, who can sort out what is real evidence and what is bullshit.
Give me 432Hz any day. If the whole world switched tomorrow, I would switch with them. Just leave out the bullshit reasons.
And yes, music is part science (technology really) and part art. The problem for me comes when people use bad science to justify an artistic choice. All of us know that performance and the feeling it imparts in the listener trumps any tuning. Even out-of-tuneness (bad scientifically) is accepted when the music moves you (good artistically).
It's not a modern idea at all, let alone post-modern. When I was a teenager, my father gave me an old book called "Science and Music" by Sir James Jeans. I took it on the road with me when I got my first parametric equalizer. The book helped me figure out what frequencies were relevant to what I wanted to hear out of my bass and what the natural balance of harmonics really is.
In pre-modern days, math was not as easy as it is today (think slide rule instead of calculator). Scientists picked middle C=256Hz for their calculations because it resulted in more whole numbers instead of fractions (When middle C is 256 the A above it is 432). I wonder whether nature cares about whole numbers in abstract situations (I think not). Tune a string to any frequency you like, whole number or fraction, and it will still produce harmonics with the same ratios as a string tuned to 432 or any other whole number.
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It certainly can be bs on many levels IMHO. However, I think that an ensemble's instruments can be tuned to different Hz levels from each other with great effect. If you have a real tight melodic and harmonic band with the instruments tuned to 440 and introduce a blistering guitar solo tuned to 432 the hook on that solo would be all the more enticing. It can be another technique for distinguishing the figure from the ground.
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Or, it could just sound out of tune.
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Go over to the steelguitar forum and you can read more than you will ever want to know about tuning, its mathematical basis and the pros/cons of tuning slightly sharp and flat.
Even very good pro steel players can vary in their intonation: Jerry Byrd, the "master of touch and tone", was amazing and he played on a lot of the earliest Hank Williams recordings. Don Helms played on a lot of Hank's biggest hits, and you can actually hear how Byrd is a little more "in the pocket" intonation-wise, if you really pay attention.
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The operative word is "Or." Experimentation is one thing that some musicians get paid for. Tuning an instrument to a different center than others in the ensemble may be more or less a no-no (but maybe not) in the Jazz genre, but someone like Springsteen is notorious for doing this kind of thing to make his solos stand out from the band's vibe. They end up being edgy IMHO. I am sure that it is intentional. Originally Posted by mr. beaumont
Last edited by lammie200; 02-15-2016 at 07:41 PM.
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Experimentation is frowned upon in jazz. Now I've heard it all.
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Poorly worded on my part. I fixed it for you.
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415hz is where it's at. Not to appease singers, but just because it sounds better.
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What a complete load of tripey old bollocks and unsubstantiated crud. Originally Posted by TheGrandWazoo
But the 'sound healing and meditation community' believe it, so it must be true.
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What makes me laugh is that the 3 'ambient music examples' could be in any old pitch, they all sound like shite.
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Say all we have are pipe organs.
On room temperature of 20C, one pipe produces 440Hz.
Drop temperature to 10C, it will produce 432.5 Hz
At 0C it will produce 425 Hz
As the organ plays it get's hotter ...
Not to mention altitude, atmospheric pressure ...
There it goes, your esoterics.
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The placebo effect is real. I have started tuning to A437.5Hz. It is 440Hz -10 cents. Don't know what it does to my chakra or chi but it is easier on my fingers.
I hate 432Hz though. Sounds like a dirge. The old French standard was 435Hz. There has been a call by opera singers to lower the tuning to save their vocal cords. Isn't 440Hz an arbitrary 1939 standard though?
BS or not, lowering the tuning is a worthy consideration. Saves wear and tear on the fingers and instruments.
Strings sound...fwappy.
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Let's accept that hypothesis. Do you have any evidence that this has ever been done? Because it goes against what is usually done. Singers, especially, are prone to go sharp to get that effect, not flat. Originally Posted by lammie200
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@matt.guitarteacher, what did you like about this post? I don't get it. 420 is where it's at, but that has nothing to do with tuning. Originally Posted by whiskey02
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Here's the thing about meditation. I've been doing Transcendental Meditation for 40 years. The way meditation is taught is simple. They have a routine which leads your mind to the desired state. THEN they introduce the mantra, the sound that you will use in the future to reach the meditative state. Your mind immediately associates that pleasant, deep, quite, blissful feeling with the sound of the mantra. The mantra thus becomes a trigger to propel the mind to that state. It's quite Pavlovian in that respect. Originally Posted by grahambop
It becomes so automatic that it only takes the slightest notion, or memory, or faint idea of the mantra to cause the mind to respond immediately and profoundly. Because it is such a natural response, it's an easy state for the mind to get into.
It really doesn't matter what the trigger is, the mind will respond. So just reading that 432Hz will get you to that state of mind is enough to cause it to be a trigger. If you are aware that 432Hz is supposed to trigger the meditative state, then, for you, it will!
Kenny Werner is a good source on this subject. Not about 432, but about training the mind to use the act of playing musical notes as a trigger for the meditative response. That's how it works. It works because you have developed a bias towards a trigger.
Once your mind becomes used to responding to one trigger, then it can use almost anything as a trigger. Pure, simple intent is the best trigger, equaled only by completely surrendering and letting go of all bias, not expecting anything, in which case you will soon be permanently in that blissful state.
The value of the meditative response is huge. I would say it's the best experience available to us humans. People who are not trained to respond to a trigger still have the experience, but it seems to come randomly. You never know when to expect it or how to make it happen. That's the value of meditation. It gives you a way to guarantee that you can have that experience any time you want it (and we always want it).
So there may be no advantage at all to 432 tuning. But once someone has a blissful experience listening to 432, and they know that it was 432, and then later they hear music in 432, and they KNOW it is 432, bang! It works.
I say again, it would be interesting to see the results of a real scientific, blind survey of listeners to see first whether they could even tell the difference between 440 and 432, and second, which one is better at creating a refined mental state.
I predict that unless a person is trained, or indoctrinated, or whatever, to expect the response from a certain stimulus, then the affect will be unpredictable, randomly sometimes good, sometimes unnoticeable.
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It could go sharp. My point was that a figure instrument would provide contrast for the band acting as the ground. With guitar string bends it can go probably even go both ways. That's all. Originally Posted by kenbennett
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