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The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

jakubmarian.com

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Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#151

Post by blt »

erbo wrote: post #121
dragonshine wrote: post #51

I have met some very competent musicians who have found 432 tuning to be powerfully effective. When I dug into this, I discovered they were tuning the other notes in the scal to frequencies in whole numbered cycles per second, using tables being passed around. So the real change was in the qualities of intervals ; many of these became far more resonant than the compromised resonant qualities we get with equal tempere…

If you're interested in this sort of thing, look for Wendy Carlos' album Switched-On Bach 2000. She revisits the material of her classic electronic music album with modern synthesizer equipment, and uses authentic Bach tunings for the pieces as well. The liner notes for the album explain the tuning systems used, and how they differ from the modern, mathematically-perfect equal temperament. She notes that Bach was him…

Wendy Carlos is awesome! I didn't know about the 2000 version, I will check that out.

Tuning is just a block of data on a digital synthesizer, but on an analog synthesizer it's not. If you use a keyboard controller, it's generating pitch control voltages with a fixed 2^(1/12) ratio between notes (or logarithm thereof). It would be challenging to convert this into a just intonation.

On the other hand, if the pitch control voltages are generated by potentiometers on an analog sequencer [1] and the musician is setting those potentiometers by ear, the musician will probably end up tuning to a just intonation because it sounds more correct to the ear.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analog_sequencer

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#152

Post by duskwuff »

NickNameNick wrote: post #114
mrb wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"if you take a track and play it a little bit faster or slower it still sounds great or awful as at the default speed in most cases." Yup. Another example: in most of the world (where the television system is PAL or SECAM) movies are played on TV or released on DVD at 25 frame per second. But to achieve this frame rate, they take the theatrical film release at 24 fps and speed the video and audio up by 25/24th (4.17%…

Whilst conversions that speed up video do happen, It's not really intentional or desirable. A friend of mine bought the DVD of 'Rent' when it first came out in our region. A month or two after it came out, the DVD got re-issued because it's a musical, and people had been complaining that the conversion had been messed up. I think she got the re-release for free.

Rate changes are a bigger issue for musical features like Rent, as it makes them difficult to play along with. For a more typical dramatic feature, it's less noticeable.

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#153

Post by duskwuff »

hamiltonkibbe wrote: post #129
nonbel wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't be so sure there is nothing special about the duration of a second. It comes from dividing a day into two sets of 12, then those 12 into five sets of 12 (12x5=60), then those 60s into 60 each. We know our bodies do follow circadian rhythms, so you have the initial link to length of day. Then everything else is split into sets of 12, a number with exceptional properties that natural selection may optimize t…

According to NIST It's slightly more arbitrary than that: The second is the duration of 9 192 631 770 periods of the radiation corresponding to the transition between the two hyperfine levels of the ground state of the cesium 133 atom. Not sure of the numerological significance of 9192631770.

> Not sure of the numerological significance of 9192631770.

It has none. It just happens to make the new cesium-based definition of a second roughly equal to the historical definition of a second as 1/86400 of a mean solar day.

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#154

Post by duskwuff »

zokier wrote: post #107
bravo22 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

439 being a prime would be an issue if you were up multiplying a lower frequency to generate it, for example using a PLL. However it is such a slow signal that it would be generated by dividing down a higher frequency. For example you can divide it down from an 18 MHz clock. So, nope his claim doesn't make sense.

439 from 18M requires a divisor of 41, which does sound trivial. Meanwhile 440 from 1M requires only dividing by 5 and 2 when first multiplied by 11, which might have been significantly simpler than dividing by 41. I wonder if there is some easy way of figuring out the simplest base number-multiplier-divisor chains for getting certain numbers?

Dividing a frequency by a large prime, like 41, is somewhat difficult without digital electronics. Smaller factors are easier.

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#155

Post by soundwave106 »

dmix wrote: post #46

Decided to try searching this and found this lovely site: > A=432 Hz, known as Verdi’s ‘A’ is an alternative tuning that is mathematically consistent with the universe. Music based on 432Hz transmits beneficial healing energy, because it is a pure tone of math fundamental to nature https://attunedvibrations.com/432hz/ Oh new age pseudo science. My mom loves this stuff and I never fully understood why. My sister gets…

Tunings (whether by key shift or by reference frequency or whatever other means) can evoke a different sort of feeling and mood in music IMHO. Music is such a personal thing in so many ways, so even though the "beneficial healing energy" / "pure tone of math fundamental to nature" thing is kind of BS, I'll allow a little out there mystical pseudobabble. :) It's just a pity in a way that the mystical BS focuses only on one number.

Personal example: As a musician, A=432 doesn't sound that different to me, not enough to make that much of a difference in tone. However I do like A=425, an arbitrary "in between" tuning on the flat side of the middle between A and Ab in A=440 tuning. It adds an entire new mood set for each key that is rather different than A=440, distinct enough to me where the moods don't overlap (whereas with A=432 it does).

There is no science that can explain this sort of thing that I know of, and I fully expect that others would have different interpretations.

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#156

Post by twic »

DominikR wrote: post #115

Funny conspiracy theory but I have to say that following Occam's razor I would have reach the conclusion that it was indeed Goebbels who was behind it all as the presumably correct historical explanation is quite convoluted. On the other hand for the Goebbels theory to be plausible I only need to evaluate: Did Goebbels have the power to influence this all across Europe? Yes he definitely had the power to do so. Actua…

You have to explain how 440 was adopted in Britain, though. Hmm, was that what Rudolf Hess was really up to?

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#157

Post by earlz »

When I first heard of this I was really messing around with different tunings and such for writing music on guitar/bass. I didn't buy the whole new science schtick, but I did give it a try and I believe recorded and "produced" (as a hobbyist) an entire song in 432 hz to see if it'd be more interesting to work it. The only real noticeable thing to me was my strings were a bit more floppy than usual (due to it being in between E and Eflat tuning). It was an interesting experiment, but I've stuck to 440hz ever since, except for one time when I tried to do a rock cover/adaptation of a song from the 1920s that was in some crazy mystery temperament that I could never properly match (probably because every instrument section was different, horns were like 435+, double bass was 432, some strings were flat at like 430 or 431.. it was a difficult thing I never accomplished)

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#158

Post by DominikR »

twic wrote: post #156
DominikR wrote: post #115

Funny conspiracy theory but I have to say that following Occam's razor I would have reach the conclusion that it was indeed Goebbels who was behind it all as the presumably correct historical explanation is quite convoluted. On the other hand for the Goebbels theory to be plausible I only need to evaluate: Did Goebbels have the power to influence this all across Europe? Yes he definitely had the power to do so. Actua…

You have to explain how 440 was adopted in Britain, though. Hmm, was that what Rudolf Hess was really up to?

The US adopted Nazi rocket designs to send the first person on the moon. There's always been exchange of ideas and it's not even necessary for the receiving side to fully understand the theory. It's often sufficient that some culture is dominant in some area and others will copy blindly.

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#159

Post by DominikR »

nzp wrote: post #150
DominikR wrote: post #115

Funny conspiracy theory but I have to say that following Occam's razor I would have reach the conclusion that it was indeed Goebbels who was behind it all as the presumably correct historical explanation is quite convoluted. On the other hand for the Goebbels theory to be plausible I only need to evaluate: Did Goebbels have the power to influence this all across Europe? Yes he definitely had the power to do so. Actua…

Hitler himself was very intolerant of any of this mysticism business. All these activities and societies were banned in Germany once they came to power. There was a number of people, in SS mainly, who were deeply into mysticism, and that was tolerated because of their status. So Hitler wouldn't have sent people to search for the Arc, but Himmler & co. might. Just another illustration of a common misconception about n…

Well, I have no reason to doubt you regarding Hitler's personal beliefs, but I wouldn't call it a total misconception.

I live in a German speaking country and the people here who still follow this ideology are frequently into the same insane mysticism. Of that I'm 100% sure because I've seen it quite often.

Re: The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory

#160

Post by dhimes »

Angostura wrote: post #149
johncolanduoni wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because that definition was grandfathered in such that it matched the previous definition of a second up to the previously specified precision. You've just moved the arbitrary part to the number 9,192,631,770. The same thing was done for the meter (defined such that the speed of light is precisely 299,792,458 m/s), ampere (current which produces 2 × 10−7 N/m of force between two parallel conductors). There's plans to…

I suspect the poster's tongue was firmly in his or her cheek.

Indeed. But damn, this is a tough crowd :)
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