Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2018-09-20 15:30
As indicated in one of my emails in the first post, I used to have the idea that some 'difficult-to-get-in-tune-with' clarinet sounds could be anharmonic. We could find no evidence for that scientifically – despite my being able to produce some horrible clarinet sounds to investigate – but further professional research has confirmed that the theoretical chain:
Steady, driven vibration –> periodic vibration –> harmonic via Fourier's theorem
...holds good for wind instruments.
Piano strings, on the other hand, are not driven; they're struck and then vibrate freely, so their overtones are only approximately harmonic.
The nub of the first post is that even HARMONICITY doesn't guarantee 'can-get-in-tune-with'. So it's not that we're 'out-of-tune' in the sense of 'playing at the wrong pitch' that is the problem ("That's just SHARP!" comes the cry): it's that we're 'out-of-tune' in the sense of not being able to match with another pitch (or the other player not being able to match with us) – which is different.
'Tone colour' (= different proportions of the whole-numbered-frequency harmonics) is probably what needs to change in either or both sounds. That can sometimes be achieved, as John points out, by changing the dynamic balance; and it's a common thing to try first.
There was another suggestive remark by Brian above:
"Even within one instrument, the pitch conveyed by the higher harmonics (if they were heard alone) might differ from the pitch conveyed by the lower harmonics (if heard alone), and this combination might make the overall pitch somewhat indistinct and ambiguous."
I suppose that seems to imply some sort of objective correlate for 'good' sound...
Tony
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