Why composers must learn the overtone series
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 16 ก.ค. 2023
- The overtone series is one of the most important concepts to learn for composition, orchestration and arrangement. A composer that understands the harmonic series can do almost anything with an ensemble or orchestra...
Alex Vaughan - www.alex-vaughan.com
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Ravel 'Bolero' - West-Eastern Divan Orchestra - Daniel Barenboim: • Ravel: Boléro - BBC P...
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#composition #arrangement #musictheory #orchestration #overtone - เพลง
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Another fascinating compositional technique using overtones is using them to increase the fatness of chords. I went to my music teacher’s big band concert & felt that some of the chords the band played would literally shake the whole venue & vibrate my whole body. It was truly breathtaking. I asked him about it later & he told me that the way he did that was by making horn voicings that followed the overtone series. What happens is that the vibrations coming out from the horns would sympathetically vibrate the other horns & in turn make them even louder & fatter sounding. Truly fascinating stuff & there is still so much more to explore!
Very good! I'm currently working on a video on exactly this idea!
Thanks for sharing that story...was there only 4 horns or like 10???
@@ericleiter6179this also works in a acapella groups of four people
It makes it impossible to take my eyes off the video even for a moment. you are such a genius and got a humor! I’ll be your fan! Thanks
4:50 Pipe organs use this stack of overtones nicely. Not only pipe organs have different sound at different octaves, but some larger ones may also have several special transposed sounds at fifths, thirds, sevenths etc. What people recognize as 'pipe organ sound' is simply those several sounds stacked at mostly octaves and fifths being played together.
That actually sounds exactly as Cornet (usually Cornet V) found on lots of instruments, especially french ones. It's a single organ register consisting of five ranks of flutes - 8', 4', 2 2/3', 2', 1 3/5', though sometimes it can be compound and 'created' by turning on separate registers. Tierce interval gives it that characteristic nasal sound. So Ravel, I suppose, intentionally just repeated that sound in orchestra.
The instrumentation that Ravel used for that statement of the first theme in Bolero is in principle the same as a register in pipe organs known as the "Cornet." This is a voice known in organs since the early Baroque, and used in several countries. But, unlike Ravel's use of such timbrally diverse instruments, the organ uses five sets of pipes of all similar timbre, normally what is called "flute" tone. These five sets -- "ranks" -- are tuned to the first five harmonics of the unison pitch, which are designated 8', 4', 2-2/3', 2' and 1-3/5.
Yes! Ravel did not create a new instrument. Pipe organs have been creating those "new" instruments since before Bach. .....and while I am at it, THE OVERTONE SERIES CANNOT BE PLAYED ON THE PIANO. The piano is not tuned to the overtone series. Please don't illustrate the overtone series by playing pitches on the piano. The piano is "tempered" in it's tuning. Back in Bach's time there were many tunings which where capturing the overtone series.
@@leowanenchak53yes, and no. You are correct thwtvnot all the overtones of a note can be played on a piano, preciceky because it has fixed pitch and therefore you cannot pull off half sharps or other nifty things you can do on a violin for example. But, all notes played on a piano have within them some overtones regardless of weather there are other strings tuned to them in the instrument.
I feel like many orchestral composers before the modern era of computers and synths are the O.G. sound designers! Without realizing what it was, I grew to love this technique in my music production, layering different types of oscillators on a synth, layering subtractive synths with samplers, layering different types of guitars, or layering them altogether to create totally new tonal instruments, layering drums for creative new timbres (how about fattening up a snare drum with a filtered door slam and a soda can being opened?). While that last example is less tonal, the point is, I and many music producers do this layering instinctively because it sounds cool and it's really fun. For many years I had no idea I had been playing around with manipulating the overtone series, albeit in a less informed way than Ravel.
Now that I've gotten further into writing orchestral music, I really look forward to putting this knowledge to work for me, approaching orchestral and acoustic instruments like a sound designer!
🤓
"Why have you paused the video so long" 😂Got me there! Already familiar with this but this is definitely the best explanation I've heard. Also, the Frequency to Pitch is great thank you
0:20 I knew within a billionth of a second that this was Bolero by Ravel. LOVE that piece.
I love your dedication to pronouncing words in their original language
I knew the first example from Bolero but that's just because I was so puzzled by that sound when I was listening to it and I couldn't figure it out, I heard that there was flute but what on earth gave it that strange metallic tone ? - So I bought the score and found out - just another example of Ravel's genius.
I'm a composer and producer, i'm gonna start experimenting with the overtone series, to create new sounds. Thank you, this video is very inspiring.
This also helps in a mixing environment. If you have two instruments competing for the same sonic space, taking out the overtones of one will make the other stand out, as the overtones "imply" the fundamental's existence. Awesome video!
My second video in a row.. i am so in love…totally blown away 😱💘🔥🪦
I never knew this about Bolero's melody. Very eye-opening! Earned a subscription for such a fantastically succinct and well-structured lesson.
One rather cool effect is hearing the harmonics (overtones) added one by one by a computer to hear how each one changes the timbre.
I wrote a program to do that back in high school. I should see if I can dig it up.
Have you found it? Sounds very interesting
I've always thought that musicians should know the basics of the physics of sound. Where overtones come from, how sound combines from different sources, how sound travels, how cents are defined, how to tempre chords yourself, etc.
The best part is that it would not require calculus or high level math, it can be a stand alone course that I think helps all musicians. I noticed a difference in how I played after I researched this kind of thing anyways. It also made music theory easier but music theory should probably be taught first.
Great video, just want to add that real instruments also have inharmonic overtones, which are overtones that do not fit in the overtone series. These are a crucial part to many instruments' tonal color, for example bells have very significant inharmonic overtones which gives them that eerie complex tone. Gongs are on the extreme end where inharmonic overtones can even dominate the harmonic ones
This video was incredible, thank you so much!
This is a cool video! I also really like your frequency to pitch calculator.
Just subscribed! Love it ❤
Amazing. Thank you.
Great info! ❤
Thank you!
Great video!
this is awesome
Cool stuff. I like it.
amazing video!! subscribed
This blew my mind. Thank you so much
"Why have you paused the video for so long?" Just brilliant. So brilliant.
This is great. Thank you 🎼🎵💜
Brilliantly explained.
Wow. I LOVE this video. Thank you!
Incredible video, blew my mind. You deserve way more subs!
thanks for sharing that cool site, also great vid.
I am 69 yrs. old. Still have a lot to learn. Thank You.
Very interesting. Thank you. Nice production work as well.
I use the overtone series a lot in my music!!
This is, just as you promised, mindblowing. The quickest sub I ever did
I finally got some pitches! Thanks!
A genius indeed
Fantastic presentation, and such a useful program linked!
Really like your teaching style, thanks for the helpful video
this is so cool
2:28 Note to myself: The fifth overtone is not a minor third, that’s a fifth (from the root note!) when he said “minor third” he meant the interval between the fourth and fifth overtone.
Minor thirds (talking from the root/diatonic scale) don’t appear initially in the overtone series until the 19th harmonic. And that’s why a minor chord sounds sad, they don’t “exist” in nature.
Extra note: the root is also called fundamental and that is because it’s the lowest frequency that it can physically vibrate, not less.
Reminder: Hz is the unit measure of how many vibrations occur per second.
Composing with 12 semitones is like choosing 12 singular number points in a dense real number interval. There are uncountably Infinitely many possibilities.
Well, unless you can count realllllly high.
This is one of my long-time favorite subjects. I think that A.I. is going to work wonders with it.
holy shit this is so cool
such a great exposition! Thank you! I wondered if there's any situation where one can truly hear a pure fundamental without any harmonics, somehow I doubt it even in an anechoic chamber the listener still has those resonances occurring within their ears so even though the room would not be resonating in the series the person's body would be and perhaps even the speaker element producing the sound would also produce its own harmonics to a certain degree.
Очень интересно! Ставлю лайк и подписываюсь на канал! Такого контента ещё нигде не видел.
Давай больше примеров, когда композиторы соединяли несколько инструментов и получался один гибридный (ну, для слушателя, во всяком случае)
Man, I am so into music and all what relates to!! Buddhists say that the world was created from sound. The physics of sound must be respected and composers must deeply understand these physical relationships of sound to create beauty in music.
Cudnie ❤🎉
4:23 Note that the trombone is an octave lower than the rest.
Ok this is epic
Excellent introduction, thanks ! I would recommend every person who wants to go further to read "Tuning, Timbre, Scale, Spectrum" of William Sethares
Looks like an interesting one until you see the price - even used ones are over 100$.
@@ornleifs this book is very expensive for sure (Springer's pricing is outrageous) but i don't regret spending over a hundred bucks in it. It's the only book where I found a comprehensive and consistent explanation of the link between the overtone series and notions of consonance and dissonance.
Oh interessant!!
I’m a musician (with uToob channel) who sees a color-shape for each note. D is orange. D major is also an intrinsically happy key, as in Hayden’s “Sunrise Symphony.” D can bring happiness. But sound can also heal. Medics apparently use the 11th harmonic (the 11th overtone) to pair with the root note, and this sound can be used to shatter kidney stones, or even cure a disease, say, a disease in the blood in alternative medicine. Etc etc. Anyway, Towards the end of my father’s life, he would cry out in his sleep. One night he cried out in a dream. I stood up, startled, then thought to play cry on the piano. It was a D note. I ran to his room, hoping to ask him about his dream. What was the secret to D? What was the secret to happiness? Brimming with excitement, I stirred him a bit and asked “Dad, dad, what were you dreaming?” He looked up at me, groggily, and said “eleven.” Then he turned around and went back to sleep.
Clarinet is a special case that deserves an explanation.
Beautiful video. What is the outro music?
My third of a brain cell cannot comprehend this, great vid
I think a similar effect to the hybrid instrument happens with distorted electric guitar. It's a well-known "paradoxical" effect that when you EQ out the low frequencies of the electric guitar (whether it's in a recording or live on stage), the band begins to feel even more bass-heavy and powerful overall. Perhaps because the electric guitar becomes the overtone series of the bass guitar or something.
This is because by lowering the bass frequencies in the guitar you’re preventing them from clashing with the low frequencies of the bass (which can cause dissonance/cancellation), it’s not paradoxical :) it’s not the same concept as the overtone series, but it sure is interesting to learn about
@@Daxxxter99 yeah that's why I put scare quotes around paradoxical :) I have to wonder though, it can't be a direct clash with the bass because the guitar doesn't produce frequencies as low as the fundamental of the bass, so I feel like it kinda has to be an interaction with the overtones of the bass guitar if that makes sense???
that's right! when you EQ you're adjusting the amplitude of different frequency spaces between 20-20kHz (to give a range). If a bass plays a low E, that's 41.2Hz fundamental, but the very next overtone will be 83Hz which is the low E in a guitar, which also has its own set of overtones. If both played an E, you would have an accumulation of frequencies around 83Hz which would make the mix too bass heavy, tiny tuning differences will lead to dissonance making the sound muddy and unclear, and higher freqs will be overpowered by the bass. what do you do then? mixing is about balance, so if you lower the volume of these low freqs on the guitar and amplify its mid/highs you will fill out the space between 20-20Hz more evenly, while allowing more space for the bass to fill its role. this is why it sounds "tighter", hope this made sense!
5:39 very cool point here! we can't get truly get away from the harmonic series because whenever we produce a note (fundamental) it will always resonate and produce our harmonic series in order of the strength of each succeeding note. It's just a fact of our universe. A burning question for me is when and where did this series originate? I've asked physicist and astrophysicists but so far the unsatisfying answer is "it's just there". I have my ideas and they are not anything to do with religion.
Would love to hear anybody else's ideas.
Fantastic video, what are some other possibilities with the overtone series and orchestration? Could you point me to some examples?
There are many many things you can do with the overtone series! It can give you a solid understanding of orchestral voicings for example. I'll be gradually releasing more videos on these sorts of topics and high level orchestration techniques.
Check out „partielles“ by gerard grisey. He is a spectralist composer - a musical movement wich is based on the use of mainly the Overtoneseries (Spectrum). The use of spectrum is pretty common nowadays (since 60s) in contemporary composition.
@@juuus2764 If you're interested I actually have an article on 'Partiels' and 'Les Espaces Acoustiques' by Grisey: alex-vaughan.com/pdfs/variation_transformation_and_development_in_gerard_grisey's_les_espaces_acoustiques.pdf
@@ScoreCircuit I think i know this article, we actually thorughly analysed partiels in class
@@ScoreCircuit I do microtonal music, so I work with the harmonic series a lot.
Usually we think of 6:5 and 7:6 as two kinds of minor thirds, and 8:7 and 9:8 as two kinds of major seconds… but what if 7:6 and 8:7 were the SAME? This yields a new interval, half the size of a perfect fourth. Here is a 19-tone equal temperament piece using that “semi-fourth”: th-cam.com/video/L8zkQp4egp0/w-d-xo.htmlsi=DE323MKvMP-Gzk1N
I guessed
Oboe and bassoon for the bolero melody
Also I’m a bass trombonist have been for 8 of the 10 years I’ve been playing trombone
Love from Sweden
Could you program your overtone generator for different instruments? This would be a really great tool for Violinists, especially jazz violinists who have to learn the difference between a C# and a Db, but also what a Blue note is. I would definitely by an App for my smart phone.
His overtone program in the description works for all instruments since it does not contain the amplitudes. Some instruments will only need the odd harmonics however.
I'm looking for the overtones that stand out when you play a Cello Drone say in Bb and wish to compare those tones with the ones that stand out when the Drone is played by say a Tuba.@@Green_Eclipse
the only problem my friend, is that this iception of the harmonic series of the other notes present in the harmonic series of the fundamental note, could only be in perfect alignment if the are tuning in the ratios of the intervals of the harmonic series itself. Because Equal Temperament intervals doesnt match the intervals of the harmonic series, I know the difference is only cents, but that creats beating. But I understand the point, and is very interesting the concept of having a Fractal of many harmonic series in ONE.
I've been long wondering whether this is the only example of orchestral writing that uses this technique. Are there other examples (except for the pipe organ non-octave stops).
A related technique is the power chord. I sometimes omit the third of a major chord on the piano, letting the overtone fill in the missing third (albeit it's a bit lower than the third in the equal temperament).
to understand harmony and melody one should study the cycle of thirds, 7ths and so on
What would the overtone spectrograph for the "hybrid instrument" look like?
please make a video on spectralism!
I will!! I am a spectral specialist!
lets gooo i’m hyped 😍
Math nerd here… you showed an image of the spectral analysis of a couple instruments.
It’s important to understand that spectral analysis like that uses the fast Fourier transform, and that the FFT algorithm takes a sample size of n2 (that is, n to the power 2), and that the sample size of the algorithm is what determines the fundamental frequency which appears in the overtone series in the spectrum image, not the actual musical note you are analyzing.
It’s a good enough approximation for doing EQ visualizations, but if you want to analyze a an instrument’s harmonic series, the math isn’t sufficient and the spectral image isn’t mathematically “correct”. You need a “slow” Fourier transform, and you need to set the sample size as equal to the half wavelength of the note you are analyzing.
I know this because I ran into this exact problem when writing software to replicate the sound of musical instruments using additive synthesis.
It’s a rather pedantic observation for me to point out, but if you want an accurate measurement of the harmonic series of an instrument, it’s an important distinction to make.
I agree that there are limitations to FFTs, but for quick musical observations they are very helpful and can be quite quickly and intuitively understood by regular musicians.
@@ScoreCircuit You are correct... 🙂 unless you are trying to reverse engineer the sound of an real instrument, it's better than good enough.🎵
The last two instruments in your video were: digeridoo and human whistling.
Would you believe I almost guessed the four instruments correctly?
I heard 5. I thought there was a snare drum being brushed.
I already did that a lot time ago and i was right then i guess
As someone who does microtonal music, I use the harmonic series all the time, even in equal-tempered tunings.
Example: Usually we think of 6:5 and 7:6 as two kin Usually we think of 6:5 and 7:6 as two kinds of minor thirds, and 8:7 and 9:8 as two kinds of major seconds… but what if 7:6 and 8:7 were the SAME? This yields a new interval, half the size of a perfect fourth. Here is a 19-tone equal temperament piece using that “semi-fourth”: th-cam.com/video/L8zkQp4egp0/w-d-xo.htmlsi=DE323MKvMP-Gzk1N
This new interval is 4/19 edosteps in 19-tone equal temperament, right? The fact that it averages 6:5 and 7:6 reminds me of 31-tone equal temperament's major second. It makes 9:8 and 10:9 the exact same interval at around 193.55 cents and this major second can function as both 9:8 and 10:9.
I apply the same concept to basic tonal music by having awareness of two types of diminished chords, ones that bend upwards, based on 6:5 and ones that bend downwards (7:6) when stacked.
Nice video.
'Hertz' is usually pronounced like 'hurts' though. I am an electrical engineer so I have used the term for decades. 🙂
I know that that's the way the English speaking world would say it, but I teach at a German university and Hertz is a German word/name. I just can't say it any other way. 😆
you know there are other languages out there, do you?
Is this music used in Army Men RTS? 😮
Literally 1984
In the beginning; there was Ionian.
1:30 "fifty five HËÆAUÜTHS"
0:42 Wow, it's quite surprising I can count there are 4 instruments playing the melody, but I can't really recognize all of them.
Question: Does Overtone applies also for Virtual Orchestra sample library? Ex. East west Hollywood Orchestra?
I believe overtones pretty much exist in any sample/instrument that's not a perfect sine wave, so the same rules would apply.
If the sound was produced acoustically and then recorded and then yes. It is possible to produce tones without their respective overtones electronically but not acoustically
Look carefully at the image you give at 4:22 - it undercuts and contradicts what you previously say.
Try to align the lines of the overtones and you will find that the gap is wider for the trombone than the other instruments. It's slightly hard to work out the y-axis. It seems to be almost, but not quite linear (if it were linear, then all the overtones if integer multiples of the fundamental, would be equally spaced, which they obviouly aren't. But even compared to each other, the overtones don't line up. Not only the trombone but also the violin, once you get to about the 8th oveetone, is noticeably "off" compared with the spectra for oboe and flute
So is this the same sequence of notes you would get on a brass instrument if you played as many as possinle with one valve combination?
Would it make sense, for practical purposes, to round down the overtone series, up to say, the 9th overtone? What would be the usefulness of a =I= F (+51 cents) in orchestrating a passage in C?
For most practical cases you would stick to the lower end of the overtone series. If too much is happening in the higher register, the chords can become very top heavy - it also makes intonation for the ensemble gradually more difficult. Having said that however, a lot of contemporary art music does use the very high overtones, and if it is done careful, it can produce really insane sound colours.
Well, 11:8 is a perfectly valid interval. It is very close to the 11th step of 24-TET (550 cents).
Try replacing the #11 with the 11th harmonic (ǂ11) and see what it sounds like.
Heyatz
Normally I can follow music theory tutorials on TH-cam pretty easily, this went right over my head I am completely lost. I don’t understand what the composer did special in that song.
What is the geometric meaning of
|octave|⅕|¼|⅓|? I think easier in terms of space.
5:30 I can clearly hear the piccolos though
it's crazy how there are two piccolos because one piccolo is loud enough
Celeste (Sell-est), no CH involved
Its funny i did guess two flutes, maybe 3, at least one piccolo 😅
Baroque/Natural trumpet says hi.
i see the major 3rd, 5th, minor 7th, 9th, 11th, etc. so a dominant chord is the most consonant?
That's a good observation, but actually no. The seventh in our even-tempered system is 31 cents higher than its corresponding overtone. These 31 cents make a huge difference for our ears. The overtone row doesn’t feel like it has to resolve anywhere - it feels consonant, but a dominant 7th chord doesn’t. We perceive that 31 cent higher pitch as a dissonance that has to be resolved. It’s crazy how such a small microtonal difference completely affects our perception of the sound.
You get slapped 55 times in the face and it really HERTZ!
Overtones + Undertones
"15 minutes of orchestration without music." Ravel on Bolero
2:41 *11th overtone not 10th, 11 is the consonant tritone
Yes, if you are also counting the fundamental. Perhaps I should have made this clearer in the video but the overtones are the frequencies above the fundamental whereas 'partials' refer to the frequencies within the sound, therefore the consonant tritone would be the 10th overtone and the 11th partial tone.
What do you think is the difference between an overtone and a harmonic? What is your definition of an overtone?
Both terms are more or less referring to the same acoustic phenomenon. As I understand it, a ‘harmonic’ refers more to the mathematical relationship between these frequencies (if 55Hz is the first integer multiple, it would be the first harmonic, 110Hz would be the second integer multiple, so the second harmonic, 165Hz would be the third integer multiple, so the third harmonic, etc)
Overtones refer more to any frequency above the fundamental tone, and overtones don’t necessarily have to have this clean mathematical whole integer multiple relationship. The overtone spectrum of many percussion instruments (even pitched percussion, such as gongs or bells) for example can be really irregular; they produce overtones, but I’m not sure you’d call them harmonics because they don’t have that nice mathematical relationship.
Perhaps I should have explained this in the video. In the end though, it’s just a question of semantics.
@@ScoreCircuitI disagree with your characterization of the difference as "just semantics". The best website on the subject is one by the University of New South Wales (UNSW), and in there is the statement that not all harmonics are overtones and not all overtones are harmonics. Mostly what you are describing are harmonics, rather than overtones, which are basically mathematical constructs, rather than physical phenomena (though sometimes they can be both)
Yes, they have some really nice articles on acoustics (UNSW is actually one of my alma maters). If I get the chance I should probably make this distinction clearer in a future video.
@@charlesgaskell5899
Sounded like an organ and block flute xd
Well, with electronic instruments all those downsides are pretty much gone. I'm gonna try it out
Huh, first time I've heard someone pronounce hertz as h(e)arts and not hurts
PITCHES DONT KNOW BOUT MY OVERTONES
Haha fresh 😂