Acoustic Consonance of The Minor Chord
A unique particularity of the minor chord is that this is the only chord of three notes, in which the three notes have one harmonic - hearable and with a not too high row - in common (more or less exactly, depending on the tuning system used) : This harmonic, common to the three notes, is situated 2 octaves above the high note of the chord : This is the harmonic of row 6 of the fundamental of the chord, the one of row 5 of middle note, the one of row 4 of the high note:
- In the example do, mi, sol : a sol, 2 octaves above.
Demonstration :
- Minor third = 6/5 = 12/10
- Major third = 5/4 = 15/12
- So the ratios of Minor chord : 10:12:15
- And the explication of the unique harmonic in common, between the three notes, is verified by : 10*6 = 12*5 = 15*4
Read more about this topic: Minor Chord
Famous quotes containing the words minor and/or chord:
“A certain minor light may still
Leap incandescent
Out of kitchen table or chair
As if a celestial burning took
Possession of the most obtuse objects now and then”
—Sylvia Plath (19321963)
“Give me the keys. I feel for the common chord again,
Sliding by semi-tones till I sink to a minor,yes,
And I blunt it into a ninth, and I stand on alien ground,
Surveying a while the heights I rolled from into the deep;
Which, hark, I have dared and done, for my resting-place is found,
The C Major of this life: so, now I will try to sleep.”
—Robert Browning (18121889)