Ancient Greek philosopher Pythagoras posited that “consonance,” a harmonious combination of notes, arises from specific relationships between simple numbers like 3 and 4. While scholars have attempted psychological explanations, these “integer ratios” are still believed to contribute to the beauty of a chord, with deviations thought to produce “dissonance,” an unpleasant sound. Not according to a new study, however, which has challenged Pythagoras’ theories to show that in typical listening scenarios, there isn’t a preference for chords to adhere perfectly to these mathematical ratios!
Slight Amounts of Deviation: Not in Sync
Researchers from the University of Cambridge, Princeton, and the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics have challenged Pythagoras’s theories in two significant ways, publishing their research in Nature Communications.
“We prefer slight amounts of deviation. We like a little imperfection because this gives life to the sounds, and that is attractive to us,” said co-author, Dr Peter Harrison, from Cambridge’s Faculty of Music and Director of its Centre for Music and Science.
They found that the significance of these mathematical relationships diminishes when considering certain musical instruments less familiar to Western musicians, audiences, and scholars.
These instruments include bells, gongs, xylophones, and other pitched percussion instruments. Specifically, the researchers examined the bonang,…
