The other day i was watching a documentary TV program which had some middle eastern type incidental music. The musical piece started with a solo wind instrument, no backing, and started with a long single note. It seemed, to me, that it was in a minor key. How did I know this? Was it the instrument or did I subconciuosly associate this style of music with minor keys? Or was it the visual clues ?
I know just the feeling you're talking about Daver, it's one of those things that we all get now and again. I suspect the answer is 42. There are so many variables in this sort of thing. If you had thought it a minor from the long intro note, but then found it was not, would that have occasioned so much as a second thought?
If I throw a two dice, one red and one green, and get a double six - that's remarkable. But if I get a red 3 and a green 5 I think nothing of it - even though that combination is unique just like the double 6.
Sorry to p*ss on the chips. Have a one of these nice new smileys to cheer you up.
If the last tune you were really getting stuck into was in a minor key ,and not too long ago, and if the note was part of the tonic triad , your ear may have had enough 'pitch' left in it from playing and recognised teh note, possibly E B or G, and you associated it with a minor key.
My brain definitely thinks "middle eastern" = "minor". Really, I have no idea what kind of scale they're using over there, but when I was taking belly dancing classes I don't recall any really chipper sounding stuff.
What note does your refrigerator hum? Maybe a minor third away from the instrument?
Which reminds me of one of my geekier characteristics. In the workplace there are often barely noticeable constant tones - the ventilation system humming, machinery, whatever. Normal people tune out these things; musicians tune them in. Or is it just geeky me? Anyway, sometimes I just have to harmonize with the tone, so I'll subtly hum a fifth or third or whatever. Other musicians occassionally join in and make a chord. Most people don't seem to notice, or maybe it's just too weird to acknowledge. Sometimes, I use the note as a drone and hum a tune around it. It amuses me greatly and helps relieve the workplace tedium. Hmmm...maybe .. I ... am ....a ... Hey, why are you all moving away from me?
Someone recently tod me that my fridge hummed in a menacing way, perhaps that's in a minor key then? I don't personally join in with white noise at work, but I have a tendancy to join in with game cube games characters utterances...I think it's mainly pikmin and animal crossing, it's a bit reminiscent of the Clanger noises but it gets me in trouble with my teenager.
Had a nice little session in the metro station with a friend who noticed the fans made a lovely drone for melodies in the key of E minor, and the whole place was a reverb factory.
My favorite song to sing to workplace / metro drones is "She Moved Through the Fair." I guess I am as wierd as you are, Bob.
Speaking of ambient sounds/resononances, etc.
In college, we had an "F#" stairwell in our apartment, which we promptly adorned with graffiti to honor the gods of the key of F#. It resonated very prominently a low F#, which made singing in that stairwell very fun.
Here's another trick to try (Please make sure you're alone): While sitting in a restroom stall, find the resonant pitches -- there should be two - one for the side-to-side standing wave, and another for the front-to-back. Side to side is generally more prominent, since the "walls" are probably more flexible. Hum the note very softly, and you'll find the entire stall vibrating to that note. The note should correspond to the wavelength that creates a standing wave in that space, e.g. a stall at my workplace has an approx. width of 3 feet, and that half-wavelength (a standing wave is like a jumprope, so it's only half a wavelength) translates to a frequency of 187 Hz, which corresponds to around the F# below middle C.
For the as-geeky-as-me: the formula is:
frequency = speed of sound / wavelength
freq = 343 m/s* / 1.828 m = 187.6 Hz
* speed of sound in air at "room temperature", around 20 degrees C, 68 degrees F.
Your homework: Find a space that resonates in the key you like, and go play arpeggios there in that key. It sounds very cool.
Okay, I'll admit that I discovered the restroom stall resonant frequency thing a long time ago. In fact I was just about to mention it. If you go around humming all the time, that's the kind of thing you can discover. That and who your real friends are. When you nail that frequency, you can really make the stall rattle! "What the @#%$# are you doing in there??!!"
Bob, the trains in the metro here have tires rather than 'train wheels' and they make a distinct, pleasant 1-5-8 progression chord leaving the station. Don't remember which key. A few years ago someone composed a modern mood piece using our distinctive Montreal 'soundscape'.
Ooh, don't get me started about the singing of the beautiful banshee trains outside my window when I lived in Vancouver. A lovelier music I've never heard. The only drawback is they were always humping early in the morning.
In my old university job I was responsible for a large suite, which was very resonant, and separated from a lecture theatre by a large window usually covered by a blackout/projection screen. One afternoon I'm in there on my own working away, and enjoying the resonance with some old ballad, when the screen rolls up, and on the other side is a senior lecturer trying to be interviewed by a BBC camera crew, but my singing resonates even through 3/4 inch thick toughened glass.
In the little town where I grew up (to the extent that I actually grew up) atop the highest hill in town, there were two very large water reservoir tanks. A friend and I would sometimes cross the pasture and woods behind his house and climb the hill to play around these imposing structures. One day we found the hatch on one of them open and, naturally, climbed inside. We quickly discovered that this was the most resonant, echoey place we could have imagined. A sound would sustain for several seconds, so that I could actually sing three notes and hear the whole chord ring and fade. We sang and whooped ourselves into delerium. For months, we went back regularly and tried the hatch, but could never get back into that psychedelic chamber.
'While sitting in a restroom stall' ...
Que?
Do you mean 'While sitting on the bog'??
'Restroom Stall' sounds like possibly the most anally retentive euphemism I've yet come across, in a world full of anally retentive euphemisms(!)
But then maybe it means something completely different, and I'm just a cynical (drunken) cynical person ....
Sitting on the bog? I never heard that one. Sitting on the john, the throne, the crapper, whatever. "Restroom" is certainly euphemistic, but "stall"? What else would you call it? Personal doo-doo privacy enclosure?
Sounds to me like a cross-the-pond miscommunication issue here. I refuse to call it "the loo" however. If I ever have to drop one "on the bog", will someone tell me what I use for paper? (around these parts, a bog is where one grows cranberries!)
Sorry, - just teasing(!)
I just hate the term 'restroom' - it's one of those bogus words invented by corporations who are scared of saying anything that might be offensive (i.e. reflecting reality).
Bog is a fairly common expression, I thought....
Stall? Well, more commonly used this side of the pond to describe something you sell vegetables off, or what happens to your car at traffic lights, or your aeroplane shortly before you die, or a place where your cow lives, or something you put on your finger after mangling it with a hammer - but it wasn't the stall part I was griping at
I do agree about the absurdity of the "rest" in restroom. It is not by any means, the room where one rests. However, nor is it, in public places a "bathroom" - i.e. a room for a bath.
Even euphemistically speaking, it is incorrect. However, I just can't bring myself to ask a proprietor if I can use their "toilet room". I think they'd just say no - - but perhaps I am a bit uptight.
Key recognition
Key recognition
The other day i was watching a documentary TV program which had some middle eastern type incidental music. The musical piece started with a solo wind instrument, no backing, and started with a long single note. It seemed, to me, that it was in a minor key. How did I know this? Was it the instrument or did I subconciuosly associate this style of music with minor keys? Or was it the visual clues ?
Dave
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Daver
Re: Key recognition
I know just the feeling you're talking about Daver, it's one of those things that we all get now and again. I suspect the answer is 42. There are so many variables in this sort of thing. If you had thought it a minor from the long intro note, but then found it was not, would that have occasioned so much as a second thought?
If I throw a two dice, one red and one green, and get a double six - that's remarkable. But if I get a red 3 and a green 5 I think nothing of it - even though that combination is unique just like the double 6.
Sorry to p*ss on the chips. Have a one of these nice new smileys to cheer you up.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by showaddydadito
Re: Key recognition
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Bren
Re: Key recognition
If the last tune you were really getting stuck into was in a minor key ,and not too long ago, and if the note was part of the tonic triad , your ear may have had enough 'pitch' left in it from playing and recognised teh note, possibly E B or G, and you associated it with a minor key.
That'll be $25.00 please.
M
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by chilli fiend
Re: Key recognition
Hey Showaddydadito,
If the answer is 42, I am going to throw in my towel. Ha ha.
AL Brown
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by AlBrown
Re: Key recognition
My brain definitely thinks "middle eastern" = "minor". Really, I have no idea what kind of scale they're using over there, but when I was taking belly dancing classes I don't recall any really chipper sounding stuff.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Kerri Brown
Re: Key recognition
# ?
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by showaddydadito
Re: Key recognition
>How did I know this?
Perhaps it's deja vu -- when you swear you've seen or heard something before.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by sts
Re: Key recognition
Wait a minute -- did I already say that?
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by sts
Re: Key recognition
Then again, as Les Barker says, "It is impossible to experience deja vu for the very first time."
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by sts
Re: Key recognition
What note does your refrigerator hum? Maybe a minor third away from the instrument?
Which reminds me of one of my geekier characteristics. In the workplace there are often barely noticeable constant tones - the ventilation system humming, machinery, whatever. Normal people tune out these things; musicians tune them in. Or is it just geeky me? Anyway, sometimes I just have to harmonize with the tone, so I'll subtly hum a fifth or third or whatever. Other musicians occassionally join in and make a chord. Most people don't seem to notice, or maybe it's just too weird to acknowledge. Sometimes, I use the note as a drone and hum a tune around it. It amuses me greatly and helps relieve the workplace tedium. Hmmm...maybe .. I ... am ....a ... Hey, why are you all moving away from me?
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
Bob - didja ever read Fungus the Bogeyman? There's a bit in there about how the bogeymen hum chords when they are on long journeys by barge.
Are you green, with three nipples?
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by showaddydadito
Re: Key recognition
"Are you green, with three nipples?"
No, I am not green!
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
"Bob - didja ever read Fungus the Bogeyman?"
No, but now I might. I may have three ni..., uh, I may be strange, but it's actually very calming. Sustained humming, that is.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
Someone recently tod me that my fridge hummed in a menacing way, perhaps that's in a minor key then? I don't personally join in with white noise at work, but I have a tendancy to join in with game cube games characters utterances...I think it's mainly pikmin and animal crossing, it's a bit reminiscent of the Clanger noises but it gets me in trouble with my teenager.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by carly
Re: Key recognition
Had a nice little session in the metro station with a friend who noticed the fans made a lovely drone for melodies in the key of E minor, and the whole place was a reverb factory.
My favorite song to sing to workplace / metro drones is "She Moved Through the Fair." I guess I am as wierd as you are, Bob.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Kerri Brown
Re: Key recognition
Hey Bob (WARNING: High Geek Quotient below):
Speaking of ambient sounds/resononances, etc.
In college, we had an "F#" stairwell in our apartment, which we promptly adorned with graffiti to honor the gods of the key of F#. It resonated very prominently a low F#, which made singing in that stairwell very fun.
Here's another trick to try (Please make sure you're alone): While sitting in a restroom stall, find the resonant pitches -- there should be two - one for the side-to-side standing wave, and another for the front-to-back. Side to side is generally more prominent, since the "walls" are probably more flexible. Hum the note very softly, and you'll find the entire stall vibrating to that note. The note should correspond to the wavelength that creates a standing wave in that space, e.g. a stall at my workplace has an approx. width of 3 feet, and that half-wavelength (a standing wave is like a jumprope, so it's only half a wavelength) translates to a frequency of 187 Hz, which corresponds to around the F# below middle C.
For the as-geeky-as-me: the formula is:
frequency = speed of sound / wavelength
freq = 343 m/s* / 1.828 m = 187.6 Hz
* speed of sound in air at "room temperature", around 20 degrees C, 68 degrees F.
Your homework: Find a space that resonates in the key you like, and go play arpeggios there in that key. It sounds very cool.
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by FyfferGuy
Re: Key recognition
Fun With Standing Waves.
Okay, I'll admit that I discovered the restroom stall resonant frequency thing a long time ago. In fact I was just about to mention it. If you go around humming all the time, that's the kind of thing you can discover. That and who your real friends are. When you nail that frequency, you can really make the stall rattle! "What the @#%$# are you doing in there??!!"
# Posted on February 18th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
Bob, the trains in the metro here have tires rather than 'train wheels' and they make a distinct, pleasant 1-5-8 progression chord leaving the station. Don't remember which key. A few years ago someone composed a modern mood piece using our distinctive Montreal 'soundscape'.
# Posted on February 19th 2005 by JNW
Re: Key recognition
Ooh, don't get me started about the singing of the beautiful banshee trains outside my window when I lived in Vancouver. A lovelier music I've never heard. The only drawback is they were always humping early in the morning.
# Posted on February 19th 2005 by Kerri Brown
Re: Key recognition
Bob said: "...When you nail that frequency, you can really make the stall rattle! "What the @#%$# are you doing in there??!!" "
Terrible movie, but it makes me think of a scene from Austin Powers -- if you've seen it, you know the one ...
And those "appliance hums" are, at least in the US, some multiple of 60 Hz, which is between a B and a Bb (I think). Hard to tune to that note.
# Posted on February 19th 2005 by FyfferGuy
Re: Key recognition
In my old university job I was responsible for a large suite, which was very resonant, and separated from a lecture theatre by a large window usually covered by a blackout/projection screen. One afternoon I'm in there on my own working away, and enjoying the resonance with some old ballad, when the screen rolls up, and on the other side is a senior lecturer trying to be interviewed by a BBC camera crew, but my singing resonates even through 3/4 inch thick toughened glass.
# Posted on February 20th 2005 by Guernsey Pete
Re: Key recognition
Ah, that sparks an old memory.
In the little town where I grew up (to the extent that I actually grew up) atop the highest hill in town, there were two very large water reservoir tanks. A friend and I would sometimes cross the pasture and woods behind his house and climb the hill to play around these imposing structures. One day we found the hatch on one of them open and, naturally, climbed inside. We quickly discovered that this was the most resonant, echoey place we could have imagined. A sound would sustain for several seconds, so that I could actually sing three notes and hear the whole chord ring and fade. We sang and whooped ourselves into delerium. For months, we went back regularly and tried the hatch, but could never get back into that psychedelic chamber.
# Posted on February 20th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
Insert a comma after "grew up)". I didn't grow up atop the hill. Or anywhere else.
# Posted on February 20th 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
'While sitting in a restroom stall' ...
Que?
Do you mean 'While sitting on the bog'??
'Restroom Stall' sounds like possibly the most anally retentive euphemism I've yet come across, in a world full of anally retentive euphemisms(!)
But then maybe it means something completely different, and I'm just a cynical (drunken) cynical person ....
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by Ottery
Re: Key recognition
Sitting on the bog? I never heard that one. Sitting on the john, the throne, the crapper, whatever. "Restroom" is certainly euphemistic, but "stall"? What else would you call it? Personal doo-doo privacy enclosure?
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
Sounds to me like a cross-the-pond miscommunication issue here. I refuse to call it "the loo" however. If I ever have to drop one "on the bog", will someone tell me what I use for paper? (around these parts, a bog is where one grows cranberries!)
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by FyfferGuy
Re: Key recognition
Sorry, - just teasing(!)
I just hate the term 'restroom' - it's one of those bogus words invented by corporations who are scared of saying anything that might be offensive (i.e. reflecting reality).
Bog is a fairly common expression, I thought....
Stall? Well, more commonly used this side of the pond to describe something you sell vegetables off, or what happens to your car at traffic lights, or your aeroplane shortly before you die, or a place where your cow lives, or something you put on your finger after mangling it with a hammer - but it wasn't the stall part I was griping at
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by Ottery
Re: Key recognition
And fyfferguy,
I'm not eating the cranberries from round your way, then
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by Ottery
Re: Key recognition
"I just hate the term 'restroom"
It *is* a stupid term.
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by Bob himself
Re: Key recognition
I do agree about the absurdity of the "rest" in restroom. It is not by any means, the room where one rests. However, nor is it, in public places a "bathroom" - i.e. a room for a bath.
Even euphemistically speaking, it is incorrect. However, I just can't bring myself to ask a proprietor if I can use their "toilet room". I think they'd just say no - - but perhaps I am a bit uptight.
# Posted on February 21st 2005 by FyfferGuy