I had a lot of fun making this, and I have some other ideas for behind-the-scenes looks at bells/carillons. Let me know what other questions you have or what you'd like to hear about!
Would love to know HOW the partials of bells are tuned. Are the forms modified and the bells recasted over and over or is the bell cast once and then milled to fine tune it?
I’m curious as to whether there’s some kind of optimal geometry involved in bell shapes. Also would love to know which music written specifically for bells or the carillon sounds the best, or least out of tune.
For literally years it has always bugged me why bells sounded a bit off. Now I finally know why and hearing that diminished chord was an absolute joy! Thank you so much for sharing this!
Learn more about music. You could have known about these harmonics, too, if only you had searched it on TH-cam or online. No offence at all, often people got to live their life first.
it also comes form the size and the fact that it is usually around stuff, so it is not as clear as a normal instrument would be. rarely you have stairs and towers in your piano.
@@voornaam3191dude literally is leaning more by watching this. You can't learn more without consuming content that teaches. You also can't learn anything before you learn it. So why hang shit on someone for learning something after you?
You can hear the carillon for several blocks around it, but it's really not loud enough for even a whole small town's worth of people to hear. I mean... unless that town really is just a few or several blocks wide in one or both dimensions.
The city hall where I live, Sweden - Västerås, have one of these and it plays different melodies every hour that I hear while walking around between the shops and cafees on weekend together with some of my friends. It has always been a part of this place for me.
There is a town in Tyrol Austria that has the largest outdoor pipe organ that can be heard across the town and beyond; The Heroes’ Organ (“Heldenorgel”) at Kufstein Fortress is the largest free-standing organ in the world. It was built in 1931 by organ builder Oskar Walcker in the Citizens’ Tower at Kufstein Fortress to commemorate the dead of World War I. The original organ had two manuals. Extensive alterations were made to the organ in 1971, with the addition of a third and fourth manual; the organ then had 46 stops and 4,307 pipes. In 2009, the organ was comprehensively refurbished and extended to 65 stops and 4,948 pipes. The sound created by this magnificent organ can be heard throughout the town. The organ is played daily at 12 noon to honour the war dead and to remind of peace. The play can be heard throughout the whole town and the surrounding areas.
After you explained the partials, I pulled out my synthesizer, built a simple patch with those specifications, and it sounded right on. I've tolled tower bells before, but never had a chance to play the carillon, so this was pretty fun.
If your synth has a ring modulator you could try modulating your primary oscillator with a second one tuned 32 half steps down, that creates an almost perfect minor third. Ring modulation = partial creation.
Wow, I knew bells had their unique partials but never saw anyone go in detail, so cool! I myself play frame drums that can have an open sound and a longer decay so drum partials is another interesting topic to me
@@joeybrinkbells Yea, I need to get into it, I tried finding some articles but I mostly find physics, it's too much for my brain. I found partials of a concert single headed tom in an article (ascending: b, [octave higher] a flat, b, e sharp, a flat, b flat...) and it looks not much like my (21" in diameter) Iranian daf frame drum. It is tuneable (mine got 14 tuning screws!), I think my tuning is quite even. I looked at it's frequencies and it goes something like (also ascending) g, f, c sharp, f sharp, b... also faint partials I ommited. Fun fact: it's possible to play drums manipulating their partials with hands on them - see: Mohammad Reza Mortazavi, he plays this Iranian drum too
This is hands down the best explanation of the physics behind harmonics I have ever seen! Simple, concise, and the perfect blend of science and art. Thank you!
When you started explaining about the harmonics on the piano, I had a sudden urge to throw a bone into space in slow motion and see it turn into a spaceship.
@@thomapple The notes he played sounded like the start of Also Sprach Zarathustra, the classical music piece used in 2001: A Space Odyssey. In the movie an ape ancestor of humans discovers he can use a bone as a club. There's a scene transition in which he throws the bone club in the air and the scene dissolves into a spaceship flying through space.
Exploiting the harmonic series was Strauss’ intention. It starts out with perfect 5ths and 4ths- very simple interactions- then ends the phrases with major and minor chords, “evolving” into more complexity.
@@Barnaclebeard: I didn't acknowledge them specifically (as you may be able to read unless you're blind or just hard of seeing), but they would obviously be included, of course. Also, "deaf" isn't a personal or brand name.
@@HelloKittyFanMan Hello my arrogant friend, it is nice to speak to you again. The word "deaf" with a small d is an affliction to the hearing. "Deaf" with a capital d is a culture. That is the correct spelling for Deaf culture, with a capital d. It seems you are not the fucking know-it-all that you think you are.
@@HelloKittyFanManThe Deaf community is capitalized. " Many people in the Deaf community prefer use of a lowercase “d” to refer to audiological status and the use of a capital “D” when referring to the culture and community of Deaf people. The National Association of the Deaf has not taken a definitive stand on this issue."
wow that diminished arpegio sounds so good on bells compared to piano ! i never liked bells for anything more than one to three note motifs but this really opened my mind to the possibilities that are out there
I used to work as a pipe organ tuner and one of the instruments that we serviced was the organ at Ocean Grove, NJ. This is in an auditorium with no heating or cooling so every time they were going to have a performance, we would have to do a quick retuning of the instrument since every time the temperature changes, it goes out of tune from the thermal expansion/contraction of the pipes. More specifically, the brass reeds would change more than the lead flue pipes. However, since it's a lot easier to retune a flue pipe and there are a lot less of them, we whould de-tune the flue pipes to match the reed pipes.
Now, I've never taken any music theory classes or physics classes for that matter but walking away from this video I don't think I have ever understood sound better. Great video, great information, and excellent delivery. Keep it up! Subscribed.
Not sure why I got recommended this, but it was interesting! I think this discussion is specific to bells with the classic bell shape, though. I grew up hearing a handbell choir in my church and I was shocked by the difference when they switched to more "modern" handbells that had a spring-mounted rubber ball that hit a metal "tongue" supported on one side. These bells, due to their simple geometry, produce a sound much closer to a pure sine wave than classical bells (or even a piano), making the tune a lot clearer and easier to hear.
this is amazing info. i've messed with additive synthesis and related things for much of my life at this point, always thinking about acoustic instruments along the way, and there's still so much to grasp about them. for one the "hum tone" is a compele shock--i'd always been informed that subharmonics don't exist except electronically or as a theoretical indulgence.
I know! The hum tone is mind-blowing! One way around this is to define the fundamental an octave lower, so the fundamental IS the hum tone. But the problem here is that the strike tone is clearly an octave higher than the hum tone, so carillons define the strike tone as the fundamental
I was not aware about your video, but just about 2 days after the upload date of this video I was searching for bell samples for my project, it made me think about that out of tune striking sound to the in tune ringing sound and ways to simulate it. I was watching everything from church bells, gregorian ones, chinese gongs, indian temple bells and also Wintergatan's Marble Machine song played on the church bell organ which I learnt was called the carillon, and also I think I have also seen you before in a Rob Scallon video. I found your vidoe recommended today. Thanks for the upload.
I never once thought to imagine a bell as a 3 dimensional wave function, but it makes so much sense! Fascinating video, I'm obsessed with acoustic physics
On top of the Metropolitan life tower in NYC is a clock and bronze bells, and they played Westminster every quarter hour, there was always one bell that sounded much louder than the other like the hammer was hitting harder. Mind you the bells were up on around the 49th floor, but they are large bells and could be heard quite a distance! My dad called me from a payphone one day, and as we talked I could hear the bells in the background, so I knew where he called from LOL! they were that loud but the one bell was considerably louder than the others. Sadly, the building was converted to condos and they permanently shut the bells off because residents didn't want to heard them.
Fascinating insights. Thank you. Without knowing any of this, I've not felt that bells were off, or out of tune, but that they had their own "flavor". Now I know a little bit more about that flavor. 😊
One of my favourite things when change ringing is ringing the bells down in rounds. They get faster and faster as the period of swing decreases, with the sounds all blending together until the main sound is the hum tones, not the strike notes. When being fancy, at the very end, we miss a swing, then attempt to stop the bells still with one catch. This produces one last loud round of strike notes against the background hum. It's most beautiful to listen to, and great to perform.
A master class on harmonics! Well done. At a young age I understood I enjoyed listening (as opposed to just hearing). I slowly became an audiophile. I met a man who became a good friend who taught me to listen to the space between the notes. A whole new world opened up. When we listen to understand rather than just hear, our brain connections multiply exponentially.
A few comments: The fundamental of a string is not at its wavelangeth, it is half of its wavelength. (only a maxima or a minama but not both at the same time. The partials of a bell are not set in stone, depending on the design they can be different. The undertone of a bell was not always at an octave... there are also bells where it is at the sexte, septime or none. There are also modern bells where the third partial is a major third. They sound strange but they exist.
I remember watching something -- probably on PBS or somewhere like that -- ages ago where someone had tried turning bells with a different profile that gave them that major third overtone. They looked pretty weird compared to the normal sloping profile of a regular bell, but the sound was instantly recognizable as a major sound. I don't know what happened to that project; I mean, it's not like anyone's making new carillons every week, so if there were a new bell profile, it would hardly take over the world quickly. I just wonder what the status of that project is, and whether any new bell-turning profiles have ever been used.
Yes!! There are a couple of major-3rd bell installations in the world, notably Crystal Cathedral in California. Intereatingly, the major 3rd bell sound never really caught on; people seem to prefer minor 3rds in their bells(!), so the quest for major 3rd bells kind of fizzled out about 25 years ago.
@@joeybrinkbells It might be for that spooky old timey medieval feel. It could have uses but I'd imagine changing tunings between major and minor bells wouldn't work well.
@@joeybrinkbells Thanks for mentioning Crystal Cathedral; I just looked up a video on them and indeed the bells have a sort of Sutton-Hoo-helmet shape that's really interesting. I'm guessing that you'd play different pieces on a major 3rd carillon; they Harry Potter theme would probably sound great on yours, but maybe less so on that one.
This was the best explanation I've ever heard. I've always been interested in bells, particularly wind bells. Always wondered why some sound so much better than others. Now I know.
Another thing to consider is the Bell's geometry and how waves and fractions of waves fit into that space. The tapering that happens between the large and small radius is what leads to most of the overtones you covered
Love this, and made me think of the Carillon I got to play in college (Davis Memorial in Alfred NY) and how it was a partial step off but in tune with itself. It was very noticeable after getting used to the practice carillon we had since that was more or less on tone.
Oh wow this was really interesting to hear! I already knew that the overtones were the cause of the bells sounding 'off', but never knew what the partials themselves were. Thanks a lot for this!
This is so cool! I love how you dont shy away from showing the physics necessary to understand the message you want to share. And that you do it visually. So cool. I had forgotten about this funny feature of bells until you reminded me with this superb video!
I think a cool thing in the future to see as a behind-the-scenes thing would be more about all the connections/cabling that go from the bells down the player’s position. Thanks for explaining why the bells may sound out of tune!
Oh wow this is so interesting! I've always wondered this but I never would have guessed it was due to a different harmonic series entirely!! Thanks for sharing ❤
Omg, i needed this video so badly. I live right next to a big church, and the bells sound so much out of tune, and I thought it was a bid silly, that they dont tune them. Now i know they dont have to! I think i will enjoy them even more now! Thank you
The guide would strike the bell on display at San Miguel in Santa Fe, New Mexico with a resin mallet to demonstrate various notes along its exterior profile. I don't know if this is still part of the tour, but during my childhood days in the 1950s it was always a highlight of the tour for me.
Would be interesting to hear an explanation of what is done in the manufacture of bells, tubular bells, struck bars, etc. to adjust the partials to their characteristic intervals.
definitely! Bell tuning is an art form in itself, one that takes a lot of work to master. The history of bell tuning is a really fascinating subject :-)
I always thought the carillon sounded off, but this video helped me to understand why they sound different and appreciate that difference instead of dislike it. Also even in isolation, the full diminished chord sounds really cool on the bells. And on top of that, the next video recommended at the end is from the Bionicle, Mask of Light movie?! Awesome
Thank you! Every year I get back to my sheet music and some day I will finish a piece for church bells! Really fascinating instrument to compose for. I live one street away from a carillon in the Netherlands. Hearing the programmed music every 15 minutes plus live concerts twice a week is a privilege.
Huge thanks for this explanation! I jag heard that "bells have a minor third", but hadn't really understood it or been able to hear it before this video
I’ve just found your channel, a wonderful rabbit hole down which I shall venture! This was fascinating, I had no idea bells behaved like that, and your explanation makes perfect sense. The demonstration of the diminished chord sounding perfect was amazing. You may be familiar with Martin Molin’s Wintergatan channel. He did a video of his marble machine song on a carillon, and to me it sounded out of tune, even though it’s in a minor key. This video explains why!
Interestingly, the harmonic series is also seen in the different ranks of the organ. The concert pitch rank is the 8' pitch, where the low C is 8' long. Then you go up an octave to the 4' pitch. Up a fifth to the twelfth at 2 2/3', then up a fourth to the superoctave/fifteenth at 2', then the 1 3/5' seventeenth is up a third.
I was checking out a video about large bells in the world and also thought to myself: these bells sound like they're in minor! This is very badass! Thank you for the explanation
thank you! there are lots of videos out there on the harmonic series, and I could find a couple on bells and bell partials, but I thought there was a need for a video that focused solely on the minor 3rd partial because it's so important :-)
Great video! I used to maintain mechanical clock tower and church & cathedral bells and few carillons in switzerland. I love the sound of bells. Maybe you could make a video behing the scenes of the mechanics invoved in a carillons?
Finally! After wondering about this, albeit on a not fully conscious level, for more than a half-century, I understand why bells sound the way they do. I would like to have delved a bit more into the physics of why bells do this, however. Something about their shape not having a beginning or an end, perhaps?
@@joeybrinkbells Oh, right! With a string, for instance, you really only have the length as a parameter but with a bell you have a fully three-dimensional shape that produces different wavelengths with different attenuation profiles. That seems to make sense! Thanks!
Thanks for this. Having spent 13-or-so years listening to the carillon of the Uni I attended, it's great to finally understand the physics of that "out of tune" sound. I'm surprised it's a simple as a m3 partial.
OMG I was cooking some music last week and tried to incopore a bell sound in it and I kept scratching my head why it was so out of tune !!! THANK YOU A LOT
Woow, great video! The other day I was wondering exactly this. I was walking down my town plaza and heard that bells, and thought they sounded out of tune. And I remembered that the toy keyboard I had when I was a kid had a bell sound that sounded terrible back then (out of tune). When I heard the bells at the plaza I realized my keyboard sounded ok, it was just bells that sounded bad and I wondered why. Now my curiosity is satisfyied. Thanks!
I had always heard that sub-harmonics don't exist in nature (at least that was Moogs assertion)! This is such an awesome explanation of what's happening with bells!
Wow! This is so cool. Thanks for the very clear explanation and insights. I imagine the math here is also very rich. Some Bessel functions going on maybe.
I'd always assumed it was because of the harmonics but it had never occurred to me to think that a bell vibrates as a 3D object. I'm English so we do change ringing here and carillons are non-existent (or at least extremely rare) but the strange sound of bells compared to most other instruments is just as apparent. That was absolutely fascinating. Thank you.
Thank you that was really interesting, I have always thought bells sound out of tune but you showed me why and how, thinking of the scales you mentioned it all makes sense 😀
In PBS's NOVA program, S16.E18 from 11/21/1989, What is Music, they did a segment where they cast a set of carillon bells with a different shape that raised the minor third to a major third.
Thanks for this....something I was always curious about. I assume that cymbals have the same features.....it would explain why there's a low hum in every cymbal. Will have to see if I can pick out the partials next time I've got cymbals in front of me.
I’m learning FM synthesis and I’m finding the best way to make naturalistic sounds is to incorporate more complex harmonic overtones by using less regular ratios(fractions instead of whole integers) between the Carrier note and the modulating oscillators.
I live in Bruges, a city that also has a carillon. I never felt like the bells sound out of tune. Different than a piano, trumpet or whatever? Yes. Out of tune? Nope. Whenever I walk around in the city center and I hear the bells (doesn't matter if it's a person playing or the quarterly tunes), I wait where I am, listen and enjoy. I simply love their sound!!! The city also has a mobile carillon, mainly used for the Procession of the Holy Blood. And while its range is of course nowhere near the tower full of bells, it too sounds very nice. Whenever I hear bells, IRL in the city, in another city, via internet, I get the feeling of being home, and at rest. Thanks for your channel, and showing some more ins and outs!
Thanks @mvl8209! I love Bruges, and have played a few concerts in the belfry there years ago. I'll be concert touring Belgium this summer, and was invited to play in Bruges again but unfortunately already had a concert booked that day. Anyway - I find that people that grew up near bells (especially carillons) don't find the sound out of tune or unusual at all, as the sound really becomes a part of you, but those that are newer to bells (and carillons) can find the sound a bit strange at first. Thanks for sharing!
@joeybrinkbells too bad you can't come to Bruges this year, but awesome that you've played here before!! I wonder if one of the many times I was anywhere in hearing range of the belfry and enjoyed, if it was ever you :D
@joeybrinkbells Today you are here in Bruges, kind of.... I'm at the Belfry now because of the Carillon concerts the whole summer. I grab a booklet of the programme of what music gets played, and today one of the songs is "Take Five - Paul Desmond, Arr.: Joey Brink"
Coming at this with a background in both music and radio frequencies, it'd be neat to see a spectrum analysis of bells vs piano. I could probably extract one myself from the video, but you'd get better results live.
I had thought it to have been analogous to the overtone series on a natural trumpet (without modern 'tuning holes') to bring the out-of-tune harmonics into equal temperament. I had no idea that bells have that unique minor third partial right next to the fundamental! Thank you for clarifying. Edit to correct a glaring typo!
I've never had the algorithm pushing a video as aggressively as this. It's been two days now! I already know why they sound out of tune, damnit! Glad to discover yet a nerdy channel though
Absolutely fascinating. I imagine that the other thing affecting the perception of bell tuning is temperature. The colder the bell is the more it sounds different. As well would wind make a difference by the time the sound reaches the listener’s ears?
wind can make a difference in sound outside the tower, yes. Music will be louder downwind than up-wind, and a chaotic wind pattern will create a warbling effect. Surprisingly, temperature won't really affect the sound of the bells at all, as they're too large for temperature fluctuations to change their shape in any meaningful way
@@joeybrinkbells I can understand the wind effects. As an organist I’ve seen many devices that alter pitch or vibration with wind. As for temperature I was thinking about the sound of church bells or a small carillon on a sub zero morning. Perhaps it’s just a perception or the frosty air but bells do sound different in those conditions.
For some instruments, the more carefully you listen to them in a piece, the more you will enjoy the music. I've always found bells to be one of the exceptions. But thanks to your video, I have a new way to listen closely to the bells and still enjoy the music even more: understanding how the bells' harmonics shape the arrangement. Unless, of course, someone just takes a piano arrangement and feeds it directly to the bells. Then we're back to nails on a chalkboard.
![These 2 Indian Rhythm Exercises Will Destroy You [ADVANCED RHYTHM THEORY + KONNAKOL]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/duBOlIt9uMI/mqdefault.jpg)
I had a lot of fun making this, and I have some other ideas for behind-the-scenes looks at bells/carillons. Let me know what other questions you have or what you'd like to hear about!
I assume you were talking about diminished scales at the end of the video. Would love to hear that on bells
I would love to see a video about alternate bell tunings! I have read about major third-tuned bells but haven’t found any recordings.
Would love to know HOW the partials of bells are tuned. Are the forms modified and the bells recasted over and over or is the bell cast once and then milled to fine tune it?
I’m curious as to whether there’s some kind of optimal geometry involved in bell shapes. Also would love to know which music written specifically for bells or the carillon sounds the best, or least out of tune.
Does weather condition affect the tuning? For example if it is freezing cold, do the bells sound different?
For literally years it has always bugged me why bells sounded a bit off. Now I finally know why and hearing that diminished chord was an absolute joy! Thank you so much for sharing this!
Learn more about music. You could have known about these harmonics, too, if only you had searched it on TH-cam or online.
No offence at all, often people got to live their life first.
it also comes form the size and the fact that it is usually around stuff, so it is not as clear as a normal instrument would be. rarely you have stairs and towers in your piano.
@@voornaam3191 learn more about talking to people lmao
@@voornaam3191dude literally is leaning more by watching this. You can't learn more without consuming content that teaches. You also can't learn anything before you learn it. So why hang shit on someone for learning something after you?
Really? You just happened to have a need for this exact explanation, yet didn't attempt to find out on your own?
Imagine an entire town listening to you demonstrating the bells to us!
You can hear the carillon for several blocks around it, but it's really not loud enough for even a whole small town's worth of people to hear. I mean... unless that town really is just a few or several blocks wide in one or both dimensions.
The city hall where I live, Sweden - Västerås, have one of these and it plays different melodies every hour that I hear while walking around between the shops and cafees on weekend together with some of my friends. It has always been a part of this place for me.
Much of the world has lost a sense of community, I think bells could bring that back.
There is a town in Tyrol Austria that has the largest outdoor pipe organ that can be heard across the town and beyond;
The Heroes’ Organ (“Heldenorgel”) at Kufstein Fortress is the largest free-standing organ in the world. It was built in 1931 by organ builder Oskar Walcker in the Citizens’ Tower at Kufstein Fortress to commemorate the dead of World War I. The original organ had two manuals. Extensive alterations were made to the organ in 1971, with the addition of a third and fourth manual; the organ then had 46 stops and 4,307 pipes. In 2009, the organ was comprehensively refurbished and extended to 65 stops and 4,948 pipes.
The sound created by this magnificent organ can be heard throughout the town. The organ is played daily at 12 noon to honour the war dead and to remind of peace. The play can be heard throughout the whole town and the surrounding areas.
@@johnpekkala6941Hey! I’m going to stockholm soon, any recommended places to visit? Thanks!
After you explained the partials, I pulled out my synthesizer, built a simple patch with those specifications, and it sounded right on. I've tolled tower bells before, but never had a chance to play the carillon, so this was pretty fun.
that's awesome!!
Man thank you so much for the idea, now I gotta try this!
If your synth has a ring modulator you could try modulating your primary oscillator with a second one tuned 32 half steps down, that creates an almost perfect minor third. Ring modulation = partial creation.
Wow, I knew bells had their unique partials but never saw anyone go in detail, so cool! I myself play frame drums that can have an open sound and a longer decay so drum partials is another interesting topic to me
I don't know much about drum partials, but I would be interested to learn more!
@@joeybrinkbells Yea, I need to get into it, I tried finding some articles but I mostly find physics, it's too much for my brain.
I found partials of a concert single headed tom in an article (ascending: b, [octave higher] a flat, b, e sharp, a flat, b flat...) and it looks not much like my (21" in diameter) Iranian daf frame drum.
It is tuneable (mine got 14 tuning screws!), I think my tuning is quite even.
I looked at it's frequencies and it goes something like (also ascending) g, f, c sharp, f sharp, b... also faint partials I ommited.
Fun fact: it's possible to play drums manipulating their partials with hands on them - see: Mohammad Reza Mortazavi, he plays this Iranian drum too
This is hands down the best explanation of the physics behind harmonics I have ever seen! Simple, concise, and the perfect blend of science and art. Thank you!
All that music theory I learned over the years (as an amateur and insufferable pedant), nothing was about bells.
Thanks for the informative video.
Love to hear Joey spreading bell knowledge. Really well edited and well written!
Thank you!
When you started explaining about the harmonics on the piano, I had a sudden urge to throw a bone into space in slow motion and see it turn into a spaceship.
Either I'm missing a reference or I'm having a stroke or you're having a stroke
@@thomapple The notes he played sounded like the start of Also Sprach Zarathustra, the classical music piece used in 2001: A Space Odyssey. In the movie an ape ancestor of humans discovers he can use a bone as a club. There's a scene transition in which he throws the bone club in the air and the scene dissolves into a spaceship flying through space.
@@Elriuhilu aah I see thanks for explaining!
@@thomapple No worries :)
Exploiting the harmonic series was Strauss’ intention. It starts out with perfect 5ths and 4ths- very simple interactions- then ends the phrases with major and minor chords, “evolving” into more complexity.
I like how everyone in town heard this video being made
Haha, most likely not everyone in the whole town, and not most of the video.
@@HelloKittyFanMan Thank you for acknowledging the Deaf and hard of hearing. Invisible disabilities often get ignored.
@@Barnaclebeard: I didn't acknowledge them specifically (as you may be able to read unless you're blind or just hard of seeing), but they would obviously be included, of course.
Also, "deaf" isn't a personal or brand name.
@@HelloKittyFanMan Hello my arrogant friend, it is nice to speak to you again. The word "deaf" with a small d is an affliction to the hearing. "Deaf" with a capital d is a culture. That is the correct spelling for Deaf culture, with a capital d. It seems you are not the fucking know-it-all that you think you are.
@@HelloKittyFanManThe Deaf community is capitalized. " Many people in the Deaf community prefer use of a lowercase “d” to refer to audiological status and the use of a capital “D” when referring to the culture and community of Deaf people. The National Association of the Deaf has not taken a definitive stand on this issue."
wow that diminished arpegio sounds so good on bells compared to piano ! i never liked bells for anything more than one to three note motifs but this really opened my mind to the possibilities that are out there
I used to work as a pipe organ tuner and one of the instruments that we serviced was the organ at Ocean Grove, NJ. This is in an auditorium with no heating or cooling so every time they were going to have a performance, we would have to do a quick retuning of the instrument since every time the temperature changes, it goes out of tune from the thermal expansion/contraction of the pipes. More specifically, the brass reeds would change more than the lead flue pipes. However, since it's a lot easier to retune a flue pipe and there are a lot less of them, we whould de-tune the flue pipes to match the reed pipes.
So that's why diminished chords sound so good on bells!
I'm so happy to have watched this video! For years I've wondered why church bells focused on the minor 3rd and diminished 5th. Thank you!
According to old world logic, church bells do in fact sound fairly satanic lol
Now, I've never taken any music theory classes or physics classes for that matter but walking away from this video I don't think I have ever understood sound better. Great video, great information, and excellent delivery. Keep it up! Subscribed.
Not sure why I got recommended this, but it was interesting! I think this discussion is specific to bells with the classic bell shape, though. I grew up hearing a handbell choir in my church and I was shocked by the difference when they switched to more "modern" handbells that had a spring-mounted rubber ball that hit a metal "tongue" supported on one side. These bells, due to their simple geometry, produce a sound much closer to a pure sine wave than classical bells (or even a piano), making the tune a lot clearer and easier to hear.
Good afternoon, Mr Brink (It's me again). Thanks for taking the time to explain it, I like the explanation! It's pretty simple and easy to understand.
Glad to hear!
@@joeybrinkbells Thanks. You know what I also like to hear? Your voice. No joke, it's really sooth and calming to hear you explain something.
this is amazing info. i've messed with additive synthesis and related things for much of my life at this point, always thinking about acoustic instruments along the way, and there's still so much to grasp about them. for one the "hum tone" is a compele shock--i'd always been informed that subharmonics don't exist except electronically or as a theoretical indulgence.
I know! The hum tone is mind-blowing! One way around this is to define the fundamental an octave lower, so the fundamental IS the hum tone. But the problem here is that the strike tone is clearly an octave higher than the hum tone, so carillons define the strike tone as the fundamental
Fascinating! My morning alarm is bells, so I've been wondering this for years... Awesome video!
That was so insightful, thank you very much! Since I watched this, I always catch myself singing the minor third to any bell I hear..😀
I was not aware about your video, but just about 2 days after the upload date of this video I was searching for bell samples for my project, it made me think about that out of tune striking sound to the in tune ringing sound and ways to simulate it. I was watching everything from church bells, gregorian ones, chinese gongs, indian temple bells and also Wintergatan's Marble Machine song played on the church bell organ which I learnt was called the carillon, and also I think I have also seen you before in a Rob Scallon video. I found your vidoe recommended today. Thanks for the upload.
I'm so glad you actually played the diminished chord! Thanks mate very good! 👏👏
I never once thought to imagine a bell as a 3 dimensional wave function, but it makes so much sense! Fascinating video, I'm obsessed with acoustic physics
On top of the Metropolitan life tower in NYC is a clock and bronze bells, and they played Westminster every quarter hour, there was always one bell that sounded much louder than the other like the hammer was hitting harder. Mind you the bells were up on around the 49th floor, but they are large bells and could be heard quite a distance! My dad called me from a payphone one day, and as we talked I could hear the bells in the background, so I knew where he called from LOL! they were that loud but the one bell was considerably louder than the others.
Sadly, the building was converted to condos and they permanently shut the bells off because residents didn't want to heard them.
Thank you for posting this. I have always wondered about it, but never provoked so much curiosity that I would search why.
Fascinating insights. Thank you. Without knowing any of this, I've not felt that bells were off, or out of tune, but that they had their own "flavor". Now I know a little bit more about that flavor. 😊
One of my favourite things when change ringing is ringing the bells down in rounds. They get faster and faster as the period of swing decreases, with the sounds all blending together until the main sound is the hum tones, not the strike notes.
When being fancy, at the very end, we miss a swing, then attempt to stop the bells still with one catch. This produces one last loud round of strike notes against the background hum. It's most beautiful to listen to, and great to perform.
A master class on harmonics! Well done. At a young age I understood I enjoyed listening (as opposed to just hearing). I slowly became an audiophile. I met a man who became a good friend who taught me to listen to the space between the notes. A whole new world opened up. When we listen to understand rather than just hear, our brain connections multiply exponentially.
Spectrogram comparison could have helped to visualize differences.
A few comments: The fundamental of a string is not at its wavelangeth, it is half of its wavelength. (only a maxima or a minama but not both at the same time.
The partials of a bell are not set in stone, depending on the design they can be different.
The undertone of a bell was not always at an octave... there are also bells where it is at the sexte, septime or none.
There are also modern bells where the third partial is a major third. They sound strange but they exist.
I remember watching something -- probably on PBS or somewhere like that -- ages ago where someone had tried turning bells with a different profile that gave them that major third overtone. They looked pretty weird compared to the normal sloping profile of a regular bell, but the sound was instantly recognizable as a major sound. I don't know what happened to that project; I mean, it's not like anyone's making new carillons every week, so if there were a new bell profile, it would hardly take over the world quickly. I just wonder what the status of that project is, and whether any new bell-turning profiles have ever been used.
Yes!! There are a couple of major-3rd bell installations in the world, notably Crystal Cathedral in California. Intereatingly, the major 3rd bell sound never really caught on; people seem to prefer minor 3rds in their bells(!), so the quest for major 3rd bells kind of fizzled out about 25 years ago.
@@joeybrinkbells It might be for that spooky old timey medieval feel. It could have uses but I'd imagine changing tunings between major and minor bells wouldn't work well.
@@joeybrinkbells Thanks for mentioning Crystal Cathedral; I just looked up a video on them and indeed the bells have a sort of Sutton-Hoo-helmet shape that's really interesting. I'm guessing that you'd play different pieces on a major 3rd carillon; they Harry Potter theme would probably sound great on yours, but maybe less so on that one.
Really nice job of explaining this. I'm not very good at physics, but this illustrated the phenomenon of harmonics really well.
This was the best explanation I've ever heard. I've always been interested in bells, particularly wind bells. Always wondered why some sound so much better than others. Now I know.
Another thing to consider is the Bell's geometry and how waves and fractions of waves fit into that space. The tapering that happens between the large and small radius is what leads to most of the overtones you covered
seeing a visualisation of the wavefront would be interesting
Love this, and made me think of the Carillon I got to play in college (Davis Memorial in Alfred NY) and how it was a partial step off but in tune with itself. It was very noticeable after getting used to the practice carillon we had since that was more or less on tone.
Oh wow this was really interesting to hear! I already knew that the overtones were the cause of the bells sounding 'off', but never knew what the partials themselves were. Thanks a lot for this!
This is so cool! I love how you dont shy away from showing the physics necessary to understand the message you want to share. And that you do it visually. So cool.
I had forgotten about this funny feature of bells until you reminded me with this superb video!
thank you!
You explain this SO WELL. And sweet playing, too.
Thanks.
I had wondered this.
I play (typically) the C3/D3 bells in our local handbell choir.
Didn't expect to hear Asturias, nice!
Wow that is so interesting, I never would have thought about what a minor 3rd based overtone series would sound like
I think a cool thing in the future to see as a behind-the-scenes thing would be more about all the connections/cabling that go from the bells down the player’s position. Thanks for explaining why the bells may sound out of tune!
love that idea!
Oh wow this is so interesting! I've always wondered this but I never would have guessed it was due to a different harmonic series entirely!! Thanks for sharing ❤
This is one of the best videos I've ever watched, thank you for this!
I had never stopped to think about this, super cool!
Excellent explanation. A proper mix of physics and music.
Omg, i needed this video so badly. I live right next to a big church, and the bells sound so much out of tune, and I thought it was a bid silly, that they dont tune them. Now i know they dont have to! I think i will enjoy them even more now! Thank you
Thanks so much for this clear and concise explanation of bell harmonics! I learned alot, and that means everything!
Awesome video! Top quality and I learned something totally new!
Thank you for this! It explains a lot -- whether the bell is huge and in a tower or small handbells!
The guide would strike the bell on display at San Miguel in Santa Fe, New Mexico with a resin mallet to demonstrate various notes along its exterior profile. I don't know if this is still part of the tour, but during my childhood days in the 1950s it was always a highlight of the tour for me.
Today I leanred something valuable. Thanks for the insight!
Would be interesting to hear an explanation of what is done in the manufacture of bells, tubular bells, struck bars, etc. to adjust the partials to their characteristic intervals.
definitely! Bell tuning is an art form in itself, one that takes a lot of work to master. The history of bell tuning is a really fascinating subject :-)
Wow, just wow. I'd never thought about why they sounded "off" and I never thought it'd be this interesting either. Thanks!
Incredible video. I was never aware of the the different harmonic overtones of bells or any other overtone series at all.
Instant sub!
I always thought the carillon sounded off, but this video helped me to understand why they sound different and appreciate that difference instead of dislike it. Also even in isolation, the full diminished chord sounds really cool on the bells. And on top of that, the next video recommended at the end is from the Bionicle, Mask of Light movie?! Awesome
Thank you! Every year I get back to my sheet music and some day I will finish a piece for church bells! Really fascinating instrument to compose for. I live one street away from a carillon in the Netherlands. Hearing the programmed music every 15 minutes plus live concerts twice a week is a privilege.
Huge thanks for this explanation! I jag heard that "bells have a minor third", but hadn't really understood it or been able to hear it before this video
So glad I got this in my recommendations! This info will come in handy when synthesizing bell-like sounds.
I’ve just found your channel, a wonderful rabbit hole down which I shall venture! This was fascinating, I had no idea bells behaved like that, and your explanation makes perfect sense. The demonstration of the diminished chord sounding perfect was amazing. You may be familiar with Martin Molin’s Wintergatan channel. He did a video of his marble machine song on a carillon, and to me it sounded out of tune, even though it’s in a minor key. This video explains why!
Oh yeah I love Wintergatan marble machine! I play his song on carillon sometimes too :-)
@@joeybrinkbells I don't suppose you've done your own cover version have you? 😆
@@316neil haven't recorded it yet, but maybe I will!
i always wondered this! thank you so much for this video
Interestingly, the harmonic series is also seen in the different ranks of the organ. The concert pitch rank is the 8' pitch, where the low C is 8' long. Then you go up an octave to the 4' pitch. Up a fifth to the twelfth at 2 2/3', then up a fourth to the superoctave/fifteenth at 2', then the 1 3/5' seventeenth is up a third.
Very interesting ! Your explanation is very clear ! Thanks !
Fascinating, I've always loved carillons.
I was checking out a video about large bells in the world and also thought to myself: these bells sound like they're in minor! This is very badass! Thank you for the explanation
Ive wondered about this for so long! Thank you!
As a bell enthusiast i see this video as an absolute win. Finally someone explained bells VERY well, kudos to you!
thank you! there are lots of videos out there on the harmonic series, and I could find a couple on bells and bell partials, but I thought there was a need for a video that focused solely on the minor 3rd partial because it's so important :-)
Great video! I used to maintain mechanical clock tower and church & cathedral bells and few carillons in switzerland. I love the sound of bells. Maybe you could make a video behing the scenes of the mechanics invoved in a carillons?
Finally! After wondering about this, albeit on a not fully conscious level, for more than a half-century, I understand why bells sound the way they do. I would like to have delved a bit more into the physics of why bells do this, however. Something about their shape not having a beginning or an end, perhaps?
it's all about the shape, the profile, though exactly which parts of the bell sound which partials gets quite complex!
@@joeybrinkbells Oh, right! With a string, for instance, you really only have the length as a parameter but with a bell you have a fully three-dimensional shape that produces different wavelengths with different attenuation profiles. That seems to make sense! Thanks!
Thanks for this. Having spent 13-or-so years listening to the carillon of the Uni I attended, it's great to finally understand the physics of that "out of tune" sound. I'm surprised it's a simple as a m3 partial.
OMG I was cooking some music last week and tried to incopore a bell sound in it and I kept scratching my head why it was so out of tune !!! THANK YOU A LOT
Woow, great video!
The other day I was wondering exactly this. I was walking down my town plaza and heard that bells, and thought they sounded out of tune. And I remembered that the toy keyboard I had when I was a kid had a bell sound that sounded terrible back then (out of tune).
When I heard the bells at the plaza I realized my keyboard sounded ok, it was just bells that sounded bad and I wondered why. Now my curiosity is satisfyied. Thanks!
This is an excellent accessibel explanation!
I had always heard that sub-harmonics don't exist in nature (at least that was Moogs assertion)! This is such an awesome explanation of what's happening with bells!
Wow! This is so cool. Thanks for the very clear explanation and insights. I imagine the math here is also very rich. Some Bessel functions going on maybe.
I'd always assumed it was because of the harmonics but it had never occurred to me to think that a bell vibrates as a 3D object.
I'm English so we do change ringing here and carillons are non-existent (or at least extremely rare) but the strange sound of bells compared to most other instruments is just as apparent.
That was absolutely fascinating. Thank you.
You killed it. Fantastic video.
Thank you that was really interesting, I have always thought bells sound out of tune but you showed me why and how, thinking of the scales you mentioned it all makes sense 😀
this is the first time I hear Asturias Leyenda on the bells, and it sounds awesome. Thank you!
the algo has blessed you. thanks for this lesson even i, a non musician, could understand.
In PBS's NOVA program, S16.E18 from 11/21/1989, What is Music, they did a segment where they cast a set of carillon bells with a different shape that raised the minor third to a major third.
I never thought I would hear a diminished chord sound so beautiful
Fascinating. Thanks.
Ah-a!!!!! Thanks a lot for perfectly explaining this mindboggling sensation that haunted me since today!! 😄
Your love for bells made my heart ring.
Nice, thank you for this insight! love nerding abouth those things!
Thanks for this....something I was always curious about.
I assume that cymbals have the same features.....it would explain why there's a low hum in every cymbal. Will have to see if I can pick out the partials next time I've got cymbals in front of me.
Ive been wondering this for so long!!! Thank you for explaining this so clearly :)
Thanks for sharing this. I knew it was due to the harmonics, but this helped with the details.
That is a very good explanation and cool video. Always knew that they sounded out of tune and it was weird. Thanks for the explanation. Very good.
small correction at 2:09. The wavelength of the fundamental frequency is actually twice the length of the string.
I’m learning FM synthesis and I’m finding the best way to make naturalistic sounds is to incorporate more complex harmonic overtones by using less regular ratios(fractions instead of whole integers) between the Carrier note and the modulating oscillators.
I live in Bruges, a city that also has a carillon. I never felt like the bells sound out of tune. Different than a piano, trumpet or whatever? Yes. Out of tune? Nope. Whenever I walk around in the city center and I hear the bells (doesn't matter if it's a person playing or the quarterly tunes), I wait where I am, listen and enjoy. I simply love their sound!!!
The city also has a mobile carillon, mainly used for the Procession of the Holy Blood. And while its range is of course nowhere near the tower full of bells, it too sounds very nice. Whenever I hear bells, IRL in the city, in another city, via internet, I get the feeling of being home, and at rest. Thanks for your channel, and showing some more ins and outs!
Thanks @mvl8209! I love Bruges, and have played a few concerts in the belfry there years ago. I'll be concert touring Belgium this summer, and was invited to play in Bruges again but unfortunately already had a concert booked that day. Anyway - I find that people that grew up near bells (especially carillons) don't find the sound out of tune or unusual at all, as the sound really becomes a part of you, but those that are newer to bells (and carillons) can find the sound a bit strange at first. Thanks for sharing!
@joeybrinkbells too bad you can't come to Bruges this year, but awesome that you've played here before!! I wonder if one of the many times I was anywhere in hearing range of the belfry and enjoyed, if it was ever you :D
@joeybrinkbells Today you are here in Bruges, kind of.... I'm at the Belfry now because of the Carillon concerts the whole summer. I grab a booklet of the programme of what music gets played, and today one of the songs is "Take Five - Paul Desmond, Arr.: Joey Brink"
Thank you,Joey.
Never seen this channel, still immediately recognized the berkeley bell tower belks and room from my one visit there
this was actually at University of Denver, but I've played the Berkeley tower a number of times :-)
@@joeybrinkbells oh my bad, I guess I was overconfident about my memory
Coming at this with a background in both music and radio frequencies, it'd be neat to see a spectrum analysis of bells vs piano. I could probably extract one myself from the video, but you'd get better results live.
I had thought it to have been analogous to the overtone series on a natural trumpet (without modern 'tuning holes') to bring the out-of-tune harmonics into equal temperament. I had no idea that bells have that unique minor third partial right next to the fundamental!
Thank you for clarifying.
Edit to correct a glaring typo!
I've never had the algorithm pushing a video as aggressively as this. It's been two days now! I already know why they sound out of tune, damnit! Glad to discover yet a nerdy channel though
Absolutely fascinating. I imagine that the other thing affecting the perception of bell tuning is temperature. The colder the bell is the more it sounds different. As well would wind make a difference by the time the sound reaches the listener’s ears?
wind can make a difference in sound outside the tower, yes. Music will be louder downwind than up-wind, and a chaotic wind pattern will create a warbling effect. Surprisingly, temperature won't really affect the sound of the bells at all, as they're too large for temperature fluctuations to change their shape in any meaningful way
@@joeybrinkbells I can understand the wind effects. As an organist I’ve seen many devices that alter pitch or vibration with wind. As for temperature I was thinking about the sound of church bells or a small carillon on a sub zero morning. Perhaps it’s just a perception or the frosty air but bells do sound different in those conditions.
For some instruments, the more carefully you listen to them in a piece, the more you will enjoy the music. I've always found bells to be one of the exceptions. But thanks to your video, I have a new way to listen closely to the bells and still enjoy the music even more: understanding how the bells' harmonics shape the arrangement. Unless, of course, someone just takes a piano arrangement and feeds it directly to the bells. Then we're back to nails on a chalkboard.