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Re: SoundNote does not accept "H"

  • To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
  • Subject: [mg83304] Re: SoundNote does not accept "H"
  • From: Thomas E Burton <tburton at brahea.com>
  • Date: Sat, 17 Nov 2007 05:19:29 -0500 (EST)

> I was playing with Sound and SoundNote.  For some reason, SoundNote  
> does not seem to accept the H note.  Sound[SoundNote["H"]] returns  
> unevaluated but Sound[SoundNote["A"]] works correctly.  I can use  
> Sound[SoundNote[11]] as a workaround, but why doesn't the letter  
> specification work?

Heh, by convention in Western music, names of pitches are unique only  
modulo octave (factor of two in pitch).  The A-minor scale spanning  
one octave (12 semitones) is therefore ABCDEFGA, where the first and  
last A's refer to different octaves. So we don't use "H", but "H"  
might be imagined to be "A" one octave higher. Note that SoundNote 
["A"] is short for SoundNote["A4"], that is, the 4th A from the left  
on a standard keyboard. Thus, instead of SoundNote["H"], you could  
write SoundNote["A5"]. In terms of semitones, you could equivalently  
write SoundNote[21], or SoundNote[9] for "A4".  SoundNote[11] is  
actually a "B4". Confused? Check out a web site on western musical  
notation :-)


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