The Harmonic Series Explained - Music Theory

[@MusicMattersGB]

Learn Music Online - Check out our courses here! www.mmcourses.co.uk/courses

[@lawrencetaylor4101]

The best music theory channel on the intertubes. With the nicest comments section. What a great community.

[@MusicMattersGB]

It is a great community. Wonderful to have you all with us.

[@jayducharme]

When I was a young student, I took a course called the Physics of Music. It absolutely fascinated me, and covered part of your lesson. It's good to be reminded of it all.

[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@elbschwartz]

I appreciate that you introduce the topic in a practical way (how brass instruments work) rather than a theoretical one. There is an unfortunately common bit of revisionist history that gets passed around when it comes to the harmonic series, where it's explained that chords -- and by extension, major/minor tonality -- "come from" the harmonic series. Good on you for not starting from that place. What's missing, however, is an explanation of how the harmonic series relates to timbre (which in turn relates to our perception of intervallic consonance). Timbre in general is not talked about much in music theory, and it really should be.

[@lawrencetaylor4101]

I believe he's dome lectures on timbre. If not, he will do one soon. In Alex and Gareth I trust. And the Music Matters Community.

[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@carlstenger5893]

Excellent video. While I've had a fairly strong grasp of harmonic overtones (especially as it relates to piano strings), my understanding of how a horn player could play all the notes of a scale (with only 3 or 4 valves) was "fuzzy" at best. Thank you for continuing to educate us "old dogs" on how to learn new tricks.

[@MusicMattersGB]

From one old dog to another - it’s a pleasure!

[@MichaelTrentColvin]

Thank you for sharing your hard work - music is a gift of God

[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@cliveaitkenhead]

At last someone has given me an compelling reason to play keyboards - there must have been a disproportionate number of plumbers in Baroque orchestras. Great video. Really Interesting. Thank you.

[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@isaacshaw1596]

The only downside of the harmonic series for brass instruments is, you can tune say the fundamental frequency, but the tubing stays the same length so it’s almost impossible to play every note in tune. Brass instruments are naturally sharp so that when you pull some of the tubing to lengthen the instrument you make it flatter. Some instruments are worse than others with that. So your octaves might be in tune but the E especially on my euphonium is very sharp but if I pull out my tuning slides it makes the fundamental pitch flat. The same issues with the valves, if you keep going down semitones with 3 valves, the length of tubing you need to get low down isn’t there so you end up missing some of the bottom range and end up at the fundamental pitch which is what we call in the brass world a pedal note. Also, it maybe a semitone but the distance between the notes is bigger the lower down you get, guitar fret boards are perfect for demonstrating that. The frets get wider the lower down you get so therefore the tubing that stays the same becomes increasingly out of tune the lower down you get because it stays the same length. There is more to that but that’s the general idea. It’s a bit of a pain.

[@MusicMattersGB]

All a challenge for the player!

[@dhpbear2]

Doesn't playing other notes in the harmonic series lead to troubles with the equally-tempered scale? Some notes would sound out-of-tune.

[@MusicMattersGB]

It’s true that the notes are not bang in tune with notes of the equally tempered scale.

[@rjlchristie]

Octave intervals remain pure in equal temperament, all the rest are tempered (not pure).

[@elbschwartz]

I don't know if I'd describe it as "troubles," but it does lead to a number of technical compromises. Brass players know some notes need to be adjusted more than others. But intonation is also a very contextual thing; the goal in orchestral playing is not for everyone to match equal temperament perfectly all the time.

[@rjlchristie]

@@elbschwartz Depends on how much you tolerate various degrees of dissonance. Thus it is subjective, in a personal sense and also because musical styles can dictate the degree of dissonance that is desirable. For example, early polyphonic vocal music definitely suffers if attempted in equal temperament.

[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@NomeDeArte]

Recently start to play the flute. Interesting that flute players use it to, but to the extende of octave and the next third.

[@MusicMattersGB]

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[@eydiguttason1961]

Complicated but it must be come along

[@MusicMattersGB]

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