Tone (phonetics)

“ Yet, by breaking into the vowel-tone with certain expressive noises called consonants, we can give the vowel-tone such a turn as to make its motion a copy of a motion of sensation, which, reaching the mysterious mechanism of an ear, will be changed back into a sensation.
It seems strange that words should be nothing but music broken up by different expressive noises, but we all know how differently we are affected by different noises. And in music it is recognized that different keys produce different effects; certain keys better than others, exciting certain emotions. ”

“ Hence, a musical tone is a note, which may be prolonged at will without varying in pitch, either up or down. A speaking tone, on the contrary, is produced by vibrations which are not isochronous; it is not a note, properly so called, and can not be prolonged, without varying in pitch. Musical tones are discrete,—the voice passes from pitch to pitch through the intervals silently. In speaking, every tone, however short the time taken in uttering it, passes from one pitch to some other through [xv] an interval concretely, that is, with continuous vocality ”

“ Musical sound, or tone, is produced by regular vibrations, and differs from mere noise whose vibrations are irregular and confused. The pitch of a musical tone rises in proportion with the rapidity of the vibrations that produce it. Tones may be perceived by the human ear ranging from about sixteen vibrations in a second to nearly forty thousand, more than eleven octaves. Only about seven octaves are used in music. The science of acoustics is full of interesting facts of this kind, and is of profound value to any one who would gain an insight into the structure of music. ”

“ It seems as if no musician had ever been interested in the question as to why one instrument should give out a sound so different from another one, even though it was [85] sounding upon the same pitch. No one can ever mistake the sound of a violin, or a horn, or a piano, for any other instrument; and no two persons have voices alike. This difference in tone, which enables us to identify an instrument by its sound or a friend by his voice, is called quality of tone, or timbre. ”

“ The full tones themselves, however, which we shall henceforth call tones or notes, [137] may not be able to make the impression upon the nerves of hearing needful for conveying a sense of sound to the brain within. The tone produced by any number of vibrations less than sixteen a second is wholly inaudible except by the help of the microphone, and even this number of vibrations brings out so deep a pitch as to be scarcely perceptible. ”

“ With attention we might discover a different quality of tone in every instrument; for all these there never can be a sufficient number of adequate terms in any written language; and when that variety comes to be compounded with a like variety of articulations, it becomes infinite to us. The varieties only upon the seven notes in music, varied only as to pitch and modulation throughout the audible scale, combined with those of time, are not yet probably half exhausted by the constant labour of so many ages. ”

“ Recourse to discord will always be demanded in music; but it is a question as to what extent aperiodic sounds or noises are necessary. We have learned to accept the hisses, scratches, rattles, thuds, and bangs of countless varieties in musical tone. Some such accretions are present in the tone production of every instrument now in use. They have arisen as impediments in construction, but have come to be accepted as characteristics of the instrument and therefore have added greatly to the individuality of each instrument. ”

“ A great deal of the irrational and injurious "teaching" of singing that prevails everywhere, and of the controversy that befogs the subject, is due to the widely prevalent notion that the little vocal cords are the principal cause of tone, whereas they are in themselves insignificant as sound producers.
It is the vibrations of the air in the resonance chambers of the human instrument, together with the induced vibrations of the instrument itself, which give tone its sonority, its reach, its color, and emotional power. ”

“ Every vocal tone is, in fact, a mental concept reproduced as voice by the physical organs of voice-production, so that every vocal tone is, in its origin, a mental phenomenon. That is why an inaccurate ear for pitch results in a vocalist singing off pitch. His mental conception of the note is wrong, the message conveyed from the mind over the nerves to the muscles of the vocal organs is wrong, consequently they shape themselves for a note that is wrong, and, when the note issues from between the singer's lips, it is wrong—wrong from start to finish, from mind to lips. ”

“ For this reason, while there is a distinct timbre for each kind of instrument, there are innumerable timbres of the human voice—as many as there are voices, and all due to the pliability of the vocal tract.
It is the manner in which the numerous individual conformations of the vocal tract affect the overtones in the voice that makes voices different from each other; for the overtones are the chief agency in determining the timbre, quality, or physiognomy of any tone. Every tone consists of a fundamental or ground tone with its overtones. The fundamental tone determines the pitch ”

“ The operation of mere sound, disconnected with the ideas which are often conveyed by it, is a subject of curious speculation. Sounds differ from each other in quality, pitch, force, and in length. The difference in tone may be illustrated by the sounds of a clarionet compared with the sound of a bell or of the human voice. Every instrument and every human voice has each a peculiar tone by which it is distinguished from all others. The difference in pitch is shown by sounding a low and a high note in succession on an instrument. ”

“ A simple color has but one rate of vibration, and it may be regarded as the analogue of a simple tone in music. A tone, then, may be defined as the product of a vibration which cannot be decomposed into more simple ones. A compound color, on the contrary, is produced by the admixture of two or more simple ones; and an assemblage of tones, such, as we obtain when the fundamental tone and the harmonics of a string sound together, is called by the Germans a Klang. ”

“ Still these high tones are somewhat broken, and seldom pure octaves of the corresponding deep tones. Melodies, properly speaking, are never to be heard; it is only a change of the same tones long protracted, the principal tone being struck before every one. ”

“ The fact that a repetition of sensations is productive of pleasant effects is not restricted to the realm of the visible. To-day, both the musician and the physicist know that the harmonic or the melodic addition of one tone to another affects us agreeably only when the added tone reproduces a part of the sensation which the first one excited. When I add an octave to a fundamental tone, I hear in the octave a part of what was heard in the fundamental tone. ”

“ The common musical scale is derived from a tone and its overtones, by making, on separate strings, full tones corresponding to the overtones of some fundamental string-tone. That which produces a "chord" in music, where the harmony is made by full tones, would produce a vowel if the main tone only were full, and the "chording" tones overtones. When, then, a vowel is sung, high or low, it is still the same vowel at a different pitch—that is, the same "chord" in another key. But "chords" are music, and music means air-waves, so that vowels are musical air-waves. ”

“ The cycle of movement will then be repeated numerous times per second, with the result that a very pure foundation tone musical note will be produced.
The Diaphone is tuned like ordinary flue pipes and will keep in tune with them; the pressure of wind (and consequently the power of the tone) may be varied without affecting the pitch. The form of the pipe or resonator affects the quality of the tone; it may be flue-like or reedy in character, or even imitate a Pedal Violone, a Hard and Smooth Tuba, an Oboe, or a Clarinet. ”

“ A perfect vocal tone sounds as though it floats on the breath. The correct singer’s throat seems to the hearer to be loose and open and the tone seems to be lodged in the front of the mouth. When the attention of vocal teachers began to be turned to the mechanical operations of tone production they might naturally have been led to observe first those salient features of tone which seem to point to a definite vocal action. ”

“ These minute shades of difference—these slight variations or modifications of quality of tone, power of tone, pitch, speed, etc.—when not exaggerated, but determined with an art-concealing art, are found to be true to Nature, and find their justification, not as exceptions to general rules, but as exemplifications of the highest principles. The refined perceptions of piano-forte finishers have led them to the fact that the highest notes of the instrument should be tuned slightly sharper than perfect, or each note will appear to be flat, when compared with the octave below. ”

“ When we desire to isolate a particular tone, one way of helping the attention is to sound that tone feebly on a string of the proper length. Thus prepared, the ear glides more readily from the single tone to that of the same pitch in a composite clang, and detaches it more readily from its companions. In the experiments executed a moment ago, where our158 aim in each respective case was to bring out the higher tone of the string in all its power, we entirely extinguished its fundamental tone. ”

“ If thus the reproduction [of tones] in exactly similar height and depth is easily attained, it is however difficult for our ear, amidst the always smaller vibrations, to which the diminished strength of the tone is due, to evaluate exactly the magnitude of the vibrations. But the character of the tone depends upon the number of variations of amplitude (Anschwellungen) , that is to say, depends upon whether, for example, in the tones which have similar pitch and therefore a similar number of waves per second, the fourth, sixth, eighth, tenth, or sixteenth wave is stronger than the others. ”

“ Modern music differs from ancient in two radical points: Tonality, or the dependence of all tones in the series upon a single leading tone called the Key; and Harmony, or the satisfactory use of combined sounds. This part of music was not possible to the ancients, for want of correctly tuned scales, and the selection of the proper tone as key. The only form of combined sounds which they used was the octave, and rarely the fifth or fourth. ”

“ He discovered first, that a musical sound is very rarely a simple tone, but is made up of several tones, sometimes as many as ten or fifteen, having different degrees of intensity and pitch. The lowest sound, which is also the strongest, is called the fundamental; and it is this tone we mean when we speak of the pitch of a sound, as the pitch of middle C upon a piano, or the pitch of the A string on a violin. ”

“ The presence of overtones determines the quality of the sound produced. If the string vibrates as a whole merely, the tone given out is simple, and seems dull and characterless. If, on the other hand, it vibrates in such a way that overtones are present, the tone given forth is full and rich and the sensation is pleasing. A tuning fork cannot vibrate in more than one way, and hence has no overtones, and its tone, while clear and sweet, is far less pleasing than the same note produced by a violin or piano. ”

“ Thus, although vocal tone originates within the larynx, it sets the resonance-cavities into sympathetic vibration, and these produce the harmonics that give the fundamental tone its timbre; the resonance-cavities being to the vocal cords or lips what the body or resonance-box of the violin and the sounding-board of the pianoforte are to their strings, the tube of a cornet or horn to the lips, the body of the clarinet to its reed—the resonating factor which determines the overtones and through these the timbre. ”

“ This law of sound secures the appropriate resonance for every pitch much more accurately than it could be secured by an effort to develop chest, middle, and head registers through calculating the differences. Again, we need the higher chambers of resonance to reinforce even the low pitch, because every note has its overtones that enrich it, and if these cannot find their proper resonance the tone is impoverished. ”

“ Tone should never be closed. It should always be open, but never out. If it is out of the mouth it is not a singing sound. Even the real covered tones of the voice should never be closed. The truth is, the form of the covered tones of the voice, through elongation, is larger than the form of those which we call the open tones, in contradistinction to the covered.
In the clear timbre of the voice, the bright tone, the ring of high placing, predominates. In somber timbre, the dark tone, low resonance, or low color, predominates. In medium tone both are heard or felt more equally. ”

“ Thus a musical tone is produced alternately from the substance in D and from that in E. One of the receivers is kept at a constant point upon its scale, and the other receiver is moved toward or from the focus of its beam until the ear decides that the sounds produced from D and E are of equal intensity. ”

“ The vocal cords act in like manner with the string described, and produce fundamental tones and overtones. In the vocal mechanism which produces the human voice, the resonant chambers are so graded in size as to correspond exactly with the fundamental note and all its overtones; therefore, an overtone as distinct from the fundamental tone is never heard, but reveals its presence only by enriching the voice. ”