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Pitch is a perceptual property that allows sounds to be ordered on a frequency-related scale, [1] or more commonly, pitch is the quality that makes it possible to judge sounds as "higher" and "lower" in the sense associated with musical melodies. [2] Pitch is a major auditory attribute of musical tones, along with duration, loudness, and timbre ...
This does not mean that frequencies above 100 kHz (1/ 10 μs) are audible, but that time discrimination is not directly coupled with frequency range. [7] [8] Frequency resolution of the ear is about 3.6 Hz within the octave of 1000–2000 Hz That is, changes in pitch larger than 3.6 Hz can be perceived in a clinical setting. [6]
Each Shepard tone consists of a set of octave-related sinusoids, whose amplitudes are scaled by a fixed bell-shaped spectral envelope based on a log frequency scale. For example, one tone might consist of a sinusoid at 440 Hz, accompanied by sinusoid at the higher octaves (880 Hz, 1760 Hz, etc.) and lower octaves (220 Hz, 110 Hz, etc.).
A pure tone's pressure waveform versus time looks like this; its frequency determines the x axis scale; its amplitude determines the y axis scale; and its phase determines the x origin. In psychoacoustics , a pure tone is a sound with a sinusoidal waveform ; that is, a sine wave of constant frequency , phase-shift , and amplitude . [ 1 ]
The study of sound and musical phenomena prior to the 19th century was focused primarily on the mathematical modelling of pitch and tone. [5] The earliest recorded experiments date from the 6th century BCE, most notably in the work of Pythagoras and his establishment of the simple string length ratios that formed the consonances of the octave.
Traditionally in Western music, a musical tone is a steady periodic sound. A musical tone is characterized by its duration, pitch, intensity (or loudness), and timbre (or quality). [1] The notes used in music can be more complex than musical tones, as they may include aperiodic aspects, such as attack transients, vibrato, and envelope modulation.
Absolute pitch (AP), often called perfect pitch, is the ability to identify or re-create a given musical note without the benefit of a reference tone. [1] [2] AP may be demonstrated using linguistic labelling ("naming" a note), associating mental imagery with the note, or sensorimotor responses.
In the physical sense of the term, the word "pitch" refers to the frequency of a sound. Another term that is frequently used by music neuroscientists is "fine-grained pitch processing" which refers to the ability of a person to distinguish minor changes or fluctuations in pitch. Processing pitch is an extremely integral part of music cognition.