
Perception of musical pitch varies across cultures (2019) - benbreen
https://news.mit.edu/2019/perception-musical-pitch-cultures-0919
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dehrmann
> The findings suggest that although there is a natural mathematical
> relationship between the frequencies of every “C,” no matter what octave
> it’s played in, the brain only becomes attuned to those similarities after
> hearing music based on octaves, says Josh McDermott, an associate professor
> in MIT’s Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences.

I have doubts about this. For one, it's a physical relationship more than just
a mathematical one, and we know that there will be sympathetic resonance when
the frequency is doubled. There are also overtones to sound, so there's a C5
ringing when you play a C4. A lot of the same hair cells are firing, so I'm
surprised the brain wouldn't naturally find some similarity.

~~~
galkk
I can easily relate to this. The method of tuning of a guitar to itself is "5
fret on 6 string (low E) should sound like 5 string (A), 5 fret on A should
sound like D etc".

When I started, I couldn't figure it out at all. The tone of strings was very
distinct to me, although this is literally the same note. And my anekdata
tells that this is common among beginners, even given that we're all were
listening to music in western/european tradition.

I'd be more interested to see how the study was reviewed and explained by some
folks like Adam Neely.

From what I read/saw on educational videos, the 12 notes system of western
music is very "mathematically natural" (like 19 notes and 50-something), as
well as pentatonic scale (that can often can be seen in many cultures), and I
won't surprised that somebody with extensive music theory knowledge will
provide parallels with western tradidion

~~~
dehrmann
> And my anekdata tells that this is common among beginners

Not doubting, I just hadn't heard that before. It's interesting that timbre,
even between a a low E string an and A string, is enough to do that.

> 12 notes system of western music is very "mathematically natural"

It's mathematically coincidental, or maybe log12 is just the base where
several notes happen to approximate small fractions like 3/4 and 2/3

This is an interesting visualization of ratios compared to equal temperament
scales with different numbers of notes:

[https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Equal_Te...](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Equal_Temper_w_limits.svg)

This is a decently interesting watch on equal vs just temperaments, and
alternatives to scales with 12 notes:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R9DX_-2JH0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R9DX_-2JH0)

