Sound’s story. 3) Sound beginnings, Noise, & The Elements

There is sound, there is music and there is noise. Music and noise somehow define each other and they are both relevant in any kind of philosophical debate on the values and properties of music and sound in a living system. McClellan puts it like this;

If tones become too complex or too great in irregularity of vibration, the result is “noise”. Sound with no distinguishable fundamental frequency, such as the hiss of a steam pipe, or ocean surf, or the roar of a jet plane, is called “white noise” because it contains all of the frequencies and harmonics of the sound spectrum. It is comparable to white light which contains all colors of the spectrum within it. White noise, then, stands at the opposite extreme of the sine tone; between them lies the incredibly rich and endless palette of our sound world, from the deep tones of the pipe organ to the crystal clear tones of the upper register of the piccolo. (p. 17)

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Sound’s story. 2) What is sound… the mechanics?

Sound is a wave movement that we can hear. It has to travel through a medium. And it has to create resonance in a receiver (e.g. your ear) in order to be ‘heard’. Three of the most commonly known mediums that I wish to refer to in this paper are air, water, and earth. Those three mediums are made up of molecules, which are made up of atoms. Within a given medium the density of that medium is influenced by its own mass, temperature, and pressure. The density and temperature affect the speed at which sound can travel through it. In the air, sound travels at approximately 1100 ft/second, in water it travels at approximately 5,000ft/second, and in the earth at approximately 8,000 ft/second. The number of times a wave passes a certain point per second is its frequency, which is measured in Hertz (Hz). Frequency is commonly referred to as ‘pitch’, i.e. the actual sound that we hear (e.g. the musical note ‘a’ or ‘c#’). The distance between each wave motion is its wavelength; it is a measure of the distance between each pulsing compression of molecules within a given medium. The relationship between a sounds’ wavelength and its frequency will give us the speed at which it is traveling, aka its velocity. Longer wavelengths are able to travel further distances than shorter wavelengths. Sound can travel faster through a dense medium than a less dense medium as the energy has less far to travel between the more tightly packed molecules and therefore less of its kinetic energy is lost in the transformation to heat energy.

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Sound’s story: 1). My journey ‘in’

Introduction

 

This is the first excerpt of a series of 7 on the vast and beautiful subject of sound. As a sound practitioner, a lover of music, someone who feels she was saved by music in her youth, a musician, a healer… I am in love with sound. I rely on it. I have a relationship with it. I know myself through it. 17 years ago – which I cannot believe has already passed – I did some deep research which I also taught to groups and at the San Francisco Sound Healing Institute. I have many colleagues who also specialize in this subject, in various countries. We know there is good mischief afoot when we consider sound’s story. May it bring your own story to life in ways that defy logic and ignite passion. Thank you for reading! And so it begins… Clare Hedin.

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