Spectral Music

Samuel Stanley Author

08/04/2020 Added

129 Plays

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This presentation is an introduction to basic sound mechanics and Spectral Music. Spectral Music is an attitude of musical composition that draws inspiration from natural sounds and sound mechanics.

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[00:00:00.000]My name is Samuel Stanley.
[00:00:02.324]I am a senior music student
[00:00:03.604]at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln,
[00:00:05.941]and I will be presenting on Spectral Music.
[00:00:09.954]To understand Spectral Music,
[00:00:11.654]we first have to understand
[00:00:12.884]some basic mechanics of sound.
[00:00:15.051]Here the graph displays hertz on the y-axis
[00:00:17.689]and time in seconds on the x-axis.
[00:00:21.190]The loudness of the present frequencies
[00:00:23.122]is displayed with line darkness.
[00:00:25.801]Darker lines mean louder frequencies.
[00:00:28.937]When an acoustic instrument plays a note,
[00:00:30.842][piano note plays]
[00:00:31.703]there are usually multiple
[00:00:32.956]resultant frequencies.
[00:00:35.105]The notated pitch,
[00:00:36.256]which in this example is A4,
[00:00:38.350]is the loudest and most prominent frequency.
[00:00:41.661]This frequency is called the fundamental.
[00:00:44.463]In this case,
[00:00:45.266]the frequency of the fundamental is 440 Hz.
[00:00:49.545][piano note plays]
[00:00:52.403]Since this fundamental
[00:00:53.454]is the loudest frequency,
[00:00:54.864]it is usually the one we perceive.
[00:00:57.367]All resultant frequencies that occur
[00:00:58.783]above the fundamental are called overtones.
[00:01:02.381]These resultant frequencies
[00:01:03.536]are also called harmonics
[00:01:05.120]and occur in a specific order known as
[00:01:06.880]the harmonic overtone series.
[00:01:09.618]In this example,
[00:01:10.396]we can clearly see
[00:01:11.450]a stable overtone series occurring
[00:01:13.268]above the fundamental.
[00:01:15.522]If we examine every overtone,
[00:01:17.035]we can see that frequencies
[00:01:18.225]diminish in volume as we move up.
[00:01:25.182]Another important concept to understand
[00:01:26.894]when considering Spectral Music is timbre.
[00:01:30.541]Timbre is the distinct sound of an instrument.
[00:01:33.155]In this example,
[00:01:34.098]both the piano and trumpet
[00:01:35.181]are playing the same note.
[00:01:37.339]The two instruments sound
[00:01:38.351]very different from each other.
[00:01:40.551][piano and trumpet notes play]
[00:01:44.900]Each has a unique quality of sound.
[00:01:47.226]This unique quality is their timbre.
[00:01:50.090]The overtones that occur above the shared
[00:01:51.525]fundamental are responsible for
[00:01:53.222]the difference in timbre.
[00:01:56.381]As you can see,
[00:01:57.371]the trumpet has much more stable
[00:01:59.228]and prominent overtones than the piano.
[00:02:05.807]To understand Spectral Music,
[00:02:07.048]it is also important to understand
[00:02:08.420]the classification of sound according to
[00:02:10.019]noise level.
[00:02:11.937]All sounds can be placed on a spectrum
[00:02:13.488]between two poles.
[00:02:15.689]On one side there are pure
[00:02:16.720]and sonorous sounds,
[00:02:17.846]on the other there is noise.
[00:02:22.380]As the number of frequencies present
[00:02:23.977]during and given sound increses,
[00:02:26.239]so does the level of noise.
[00:02:28.868]I will explain this spectrum further
[00:02:30.369]through example.
[00:02:33.862]The purest and most sonorous sound is a
[00:02:35.769]sine wave generated by a computer synthesizer.
[00:02:39.076]As you can see, a sine wave does not
[00:02:41.191]produce any overtones.
[00:02:43.196]This means that only the fundamental
[00:02:44.566]is produced.
[00:02:46.349]This makes the sine wave sound very plain.
[00:02:48.448][sine wave plays]
[00:02:50.408]Just to the right of the sine wave
[00:02:51.820]on the noise spectrum is sound produced
[00:02:53.649]by a single instrument playing a single note.
[00:02:56.860]Here I am using the piano example again.
[00:03:00.486]The piano sound is slightly more noisy
[00:03:02.363]than the sine wave because more frequencies
[00:03:04.422]result during its production.
[00:03:06.110][piano note plays]
[00:03:09.893]Now let's examine noisy sounds.
[00:03:13.131]The sound of white noise can be thought of
[00:03:14.658]as "perfect noise" where nearly every
[00:03:16.809]audible frequency is present all at once.
[00:03:20.886]All frequencies are also very loud.
[00:03:23.711]This results in a rather unpleasant,
[00:03:25.292]overwhelming sound.
[00:03:27.499]If the volume is high on our device,
[00:03:29.611]I would suggest turning it down before
[00:03:31.091]I play this audio clip.
[00:03:35.997][white noise plays]
[00:03:40.504]The sound of a thunderstorm is less noisy
[00:03:42.306]because less frequencies are present.
[00:03:44.628]If we examine the image, we see a lot of grey.
[00:03:48.410]This grey represents the sound of the rain.
[00:03:51.197]When the thunder strikes, we get a bump
[00:03:53.369]in the low frequencies.
[00:03:56.278]This results in a more pleasant, natural sound.
[00:03:59.229][thunderstorm sounds play]
[00:04:12.987]Now that we have a basic understand of
[00:04:14.850]sound mechanics, we are ready to talk about
[00:04:16.684]Spectral Music.
[00:04:18.574]Spectral Music began as a musical movement
[00:04:20.659]in the 1970's.
[00:04:22.333]It primarily took place in Paris, France,
[00:04:24.388]at the Institute for Research and Coordination
[00:04:26.739]in Acoustics/Music or IRCAM for short.
[00:04:31.327]The composers there took inspiration from
[00:04:33.332]natural sound phenomenon and used new technologies
[00:04:36.205]like spectrograms and computer software to
[00:04:38.406]analyze sounds.
[00:04:40.441]Spectral composers don't follow one
[00:04:42.372]concrete method of composing.
[00:04:44.318]Instead they consider the creation of
[00:04:46.569]Spectral Music to be an artistic attitude.
[00:04:49.648]One of the most important features
[00:04:51.186]of Spectral Music is the blurring of the
[00:04:52.933]traditional distinction between timbre and harmony.
[00:04:57.352]Spectral composers use their knowledge
[00:04:58.922]of sound mechanics to create new timbres,
[00:05:01.142]usually by strategically placing frequencies
[00:05:03.416]to emulate natural sounds.
[00:05:05.924]Spectral Music often employs use of the
[00:05:08.364]noise spectrum as the structural dichotomy
[00:05:10.702]for musical works.
[00:05:13.108]Let's examine an example of how this plays
[00:05:15.588]out in real music.
[00:05:20.219]Here is a spectrogram image of an excerpt
[00:05:22.184]from Kaija Saariaho's Violin Concerto
[00:05:24.534]entitled "Graal théâtre".
[00:05:27.223]In this excerpt, the influence of
[00:05:29.048]Spectral Music on Saariaho's work is clear.
[00:05:32.346]When I play the excerpt, listen to how the
[00:05:34.650]noise peaks near the beginning and
[00:05:36.236]decreases throughout.
[00:05:39.433]This exhibits the importance of the noise
[00:05:42.048]spectrum.
[00:05:49.602]Also listen for the way the line between
[00:05:51.972]timbre and harmony is
[00:05:53.363]blurred in this sound mass.
[00:05:56.554]In this excerpt, it is almost as if the
[00:05:58.756]noise of the orchestra encloses around
[00:06:00.496]the violin's sonorous sound quality.
[00:06:02.880]The violin seemingly escapes the noise
[00:06:04.880]as it ascends.
[00:06:07.696]["Graal théâtre" by Kaija Saariaho plays]
[00:06:32.541]Now I will briefly go over my own method
[00:06:35.239]for analyzing sounds and turning them into
[00:06:36.954]musical materials.
[00:06:39.013]First I analyze a sound in a computer
[00:06:41.191]program called SPEAR which provides a
[00:06:43.227]spectrogram image.
[00:06:44.900]In this case the sound is a Lion's roar.
[00:06:49.589][Lion's roar plays]
[00:06:53.653]Second I use a software function to reduce
[00:06:56.047]the sound data as much as possible while
[00:06:58.489]still preserving the integrity and gesture
[00:07:00.676]of the sound.
[00:07:03.002][reduced lion's roar plays]
[00:07:09.063]Third I use another software function to
[00:07:11.224]collect data on the frequencies.
[00:07:15.096]Fourth I use a piece of software I wrote
[00:07:17.154]to convert the frequency data into musical
[00:07:19.467]pitches.
[00:07:21.699]Fifth and lastly I analyze the data and
[00:07:24.472]attempt to notate it.
[00:07:29.047]Here I will play the final product for you.
[00:07:31.708]This is a recording featuring Lucy Collins
[00:07:33.822]on all the violin and viola parts and me
[00:07:36.630]on the cello and bass parts.
[00:07:39.691][orchestral snippet plays]
[00:07:48.583]The result captures the gesture of the
[00:07:50.041]original sound, but gives it an orchestral
[00:07:52.039]quality.
[00:07:53.826]Alright, so with that I will conclude
[00:07:55.885]this presentation on Spectral Music.
[00:07:58.297]Thanks for watching!

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Tags:
Spectral
Music
Kaija Saariaho
Sound Mechanics
Research
UCARE Summer 2020

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