wilhoit wrote:Any insight, similar experiences, or wild hunches would be welcome.
I like bassoon, oboe, and French horn (brass, but so what), because they have interesting textures, but in the bass register my primary focus is on acoustic bass and electric bass, since I play both of them, although primarily electric bass; so I am replying because this involves bass and low frequencies, not that I know anything about bassoon other than I like its textures . . . These are a few observations and bits of information that might be relevant in one way or another:
(1) FREQUENCY PERCEPTION: The perception of frequency--called "pitch"--is a fascinating phenomenon, and it is considerably more complex than most folks imagine, especially with respect to being influenced by auditory illusions, where one of the most troublesome auditory illusions affecting the perception of low frequencies is the "Missing Fundamental" auditory illusion . . .
Missing Fundamental Auditory Illusion (Wikipedia)An intriguing hypothesis regarding the "Missing Fundamental" auditory illusion suggests that there are two general types of listeners or "hearers" on this planet, (a) fundamental tone hearers and (b) overtone hearers . . .
This hypothesis springs from research done approximately 10 years ago at Heidelberg University in Germany, and the researchers provided a quick test that can be used to determine whether someone is a fundamental tone hearer or an overtone hearer . . .
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NOTE: The quick test for determining hearing type is found at the following link. The sounds are in a FLAC format audio file, so you need a player that plays FLAC format audio files; and the test is easier when you listen with headphones, but it also works when you listen with loudspeaker units . . . ]
How do you hear tones? (Hydrogenaudio FORUM)It took me a while to make sense of the technical language, and at first my understanding was exactly the opposite, but it eventually made sense; and the way it works is that fundamental tone hearers are easily tricked by the "Missing Fundamental" auditory illusion, since they synthesize the missing fundamental and essentially "fill in the blanks", which is a problem when the focus shifts to the role of producer, since for all practical purposes fundamental tone hearers cannot trust their ears unless everything is verified with meters and other measuring devices commonly used in acoustic physics . . .
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NOTE: I am a fundamental tone hearer, which is excellent, but it requires a calibrated full-range studio monitor system, which actually is a requirement for everyone, really . . . ]
There is a solution, however, and the solution is to have a calibrated full-range studio monitor system and a nice set of metering equipment (hardware and software), since (a) correctly adjusted and maintained meters and measuring devices, including metering and measuring software, do
not have personal beliefs and opinions and (b) you
can trust a calibrated full-range studio monitor system, where I specifically define this to be a studio monitor system that has a frequency range running from 10-Hz to 20,000-Hz with a flat equal loudness curve at 85 dB SPL, with 85 dB SPL being the ideal sound pressure level for final mixing and mastering . . .
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NOTE: Since the subsonic and deep bass is present and heard accurately with a calibrated full-range studio monitor system, you can trust your ears, because everything is present. You need to hear it to produce and mix it correctly. Headphones are convenient some of the time, but for final mixing and mastering it is important to use a calibrated full-range studio monitor system. Also, note that the frequency range of normal human hearing generally is defined to be 20-Hz to 20,000-Hz, but I extend it downward to 10-Hz, since there is subsonic material in most sampled sound libraries and while subsonic audio is tactile rather than audio for most people, it is a key aspect of certain modern music genres, where among other things it serves as a tactile early warning system, due to the facts (a) that the wavelength of a 10-Hz sine wave is approximately 113 feet; (b) that these sound waves travel at approximately 1,125 feet per second at sea level; (c) that these waves travel through virtually everything easily; and (d) that this is approximately 25 feet per second faster than a vehicle traveling at 60 miles per hour, all of which is a particularly abstruse way of explaining the fact that you feel the stampeding herd of elephants at least a few seconds before they appear . . . ]
(2) REFERENCE TUNING PITCH: The default reference tuning pitch in NOTION 4 is not 440-Hz (standard "Concert A" in the US). If your focus is on popular music, then it is best to set the reference tuning pitch in NOTION 4 to 440-Hz, which is done on the "General" tab of NOTION 4 "Preferences" via the "Global tuning" slider . . .
(3) CHROMATIC SAMPLING: There are different strategies used in sampled sound libraries, but the most complete strategy involves sampling every note in every articulation, dynamic, playing style, and so forth and so on, where the key bit of information is that the more extensive the sampling strategy the most expensive the sample sound library . . .
It is more common for a sample sound library to provide samples for some of the notes in various articulations, dynamics, and playing styles but not all of them; and when this happens some of the notes are computed using various types of logarithmic extrapolation and other techniques, where as an example if C4 ("Middle C" in standard scientific pitch notation) and D4 are sampled but C#4 is not sampled, then the sound for a C#4 note will be computed by the virtual instrument engine, using either C4 or D as the basis, which generally works nicely unless there is a time-based or motion-based component like tremolo or vibrato, in which case if the lower frequency sample is used and increased in speed, then its tremolo or vibrato rate also increases, as is the case if D is used, except that instead of the tremolo or vibrato rate increasing, it decreases, where the general rule is that if tremolo or vibrato can be applied later via an effects plug-in, this results in better consistency, noting that I am using "tremolo" and "vibrato" the way they are used in the electric guitar universe, although no matter how the terms are used, arbitrarily decreasing or increasing via an algorithm can be troublesome . . .
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NOTE: This might provide a clue to the existence of a note which does not exist and cannot be played on a bassoon, where instead of being a real note, it is a computed note . . . ]
(4) FREQUENCY IS LOGARITHMIC: Frequency is logarithmic in music, and an octave spans 1,200 cents, where each semitone maps to 100 cents. The difference in the root frequencies of adjacent notes in the bass register or region is very small, where for example at standard tuning ("Concert A" = 440-Hz), (a) the low-pitch "
A" string of an electric bass or acoustic bass is 55-Hz and (b) the low-pitch "
E" string of an electric bass or acoustic bass is 41.203-Hz . . .
Yet, there are six notes {E1, F1, F#1, G1, G#1, A1} when one excludes the possibility of flats and sharps being different as well as multiple, which this basically is what I call the "grand piano perspective", in the sense that no matter how many different names one concocts for "Middle C", they all map to the same single key on a standard grand piano . . .
Overall, this maps to what in the soprano register would be a tiny variation instead being a significant variation in the bass register; and when combined with some of the other aspects of auditory perception and sampled sound strategies in the digital universe, this can be a problem or at least something to consider in the grand scheme of everything . . .
(5) NOTION 4 SOUNDS: I think that the NOTION 4 Bundled sounds are chromatically sampled, as are the various Expansion Sound collections . . .
(6) CORRECTIONS TO NOTION 4 SOUNDS: As best as I can recall, there have been some fixes for various problems with a few of the NOTION 4 sampled sounds (Bundled and Expansion Sound collections) . . .
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