Pedal Tones

[TexTuba]

And the reverse applies.

Plus, since when does "(okay, maybe incorrectly)" mean I'm convinced?

Believe whatever you want...

[eupher61]

Take a string, stretched to whatever tension. Length makes no difference.

Pluck that string. The pitch which is produced is the fundamental pitch of the string. That is also the first note of the overtone series, or the partials, or the harmonics, of the string. The whole is a partial, yes. Ratio of 1:1

Divide that string in half, pluck. You should get the octave. Second partial. 1:2

The false tones are not part of the overtone series. Thus, they are not "pedal tones" as is generally accepted. They are called False Tones because their fundamental is not really playable on the instrument with that fingering. Show me an Eb on a BBb tuba, aside from the false tone or screech range, played open. It ain't there.

I'm not a scientist by any stretch, but them's about as close to facts as any acoustician could do in plain language. I'll find my colij textbook if needed.

steve

[GC]

The false tones are not part of the overtone series. Thus, they are not "pedal tones" as is generally accepted. They are called False Tones because their fundamental is not really playable on the instrument with that fingering. Show me an Eb on a BBb tuba, aside from the false tone or screech range, played open. It ain't there.

This makes some sense, but I think it misses the point again. No matter what you want to say about false tones and their genesis, they are very definitely playable on the instrument. There have been innumberable posts here about use of false tones. They do not resonate as well as tones from the harmonic series, but they definitely have musical value. But that has little to do with definitions of pedal tones unless you insist that pedal tones MUST be generated from the harmonic range. I haven't seen any reason that it must be restricted to that other than "because I said so".

@TexTuba: "Believe whatever you want..."

Meh. http://www.coldfusionjedi.com/images/TR ... -97874.jpg

[sloan]

Take a string, stretched to whatever tension. Length makes no difference.

Tubas do not use strings.

That way be dragons.

[Donn]

The false tones are not part of the overtone series. Thus, they are not "pedal tones" as is generally accepted. They are called False Tones because their fundamental is not really playable on the instrument with that fingering. Show me an Eb on a BBb tuba, aside from the false tone or screech range, played open. It ain't there.

I'm not a scientist by any stretch, but them's about as close to facts as any acoustician could do in plain language. I'll find my colij textbook if needed.

As painful as this must be to some, facts don't really apply here. It's this silly word, "pedal", and what's really its "general accepted" meaning. No one is in possession of the facts about that, because there really aren't any.

At best, if we all agree on a definition that's meaningful in terms of the acoustics of brass instruments, we should still remember when speaking to others that outside of this context, "pedal" just means really low note as would be played on the pedals of an organ, and if there were such a thing as a factual definition, that would probably be it.

(minor nitpick: I think the first sentence above should say "partial series" - I thought "overtone" describes all the partials but the fundamental, so if false tones aren't overtones, if anything that would actually support the "pedal" classification.)

[sloan]

On a barely related topic...

...I encountered this today (arrangement of "Silent Night" done by a typical inexperienced arranger who wrote too low for the tuba) at midday downtown Christmas orchestra concert.

In the rehearsal, I "fixed" it and played the two-ledger-line Bb. Today (at the performance), I went ahead and played it. The bass trombonist was delighted.

A real man would have taken it down an octave!

[Mark]

On a barely related topic...

...I encountered this today (arrangement of "Silent Night" done by a typical inexperienced arranger who wrote too low for the tuba) at midday downtown Christmas orchestra concert.

In the rehearsal, I "fixed" it and played the two-ledger-line Bb. Today (at the performance), I went ahead and played it. The bass trombonist was delighted.

I ran into a Chanukah arrangement done by an inexperienced arranger (I assume) that had D's and Eb's above that note. So? They were sixteenths at quarter = 120.

[Kevin Hendrick]

Take a string, stretched to whatever tension. Length makes no difference.

Tubas do not use strings.

That way be dragons.

Mine does -- four of 'em (one for each rotor) ...

[imperialbari]

At least one sane definition would be the stops playable by the pedal keyboard, which as far as I know always encompass the 16' (and if available the 32') stops. But of course organs almost always are complex insofar that an 8' stop coupled with a 5-1/3' stop will mimic the effect of a 16' stop. So there are stops that can be assigned to manual as well as pedal keyboards.

Klaus

[PMeuph]

Sloan, apparently the whoosh was the whole "organ" thing going over everyone's heads??? Where is Robert Coulter to tell us about which notes are actually pedal tones that an organist plays with his feet? Those are real pedal tones. Anything else is whatever we adapt to the tuba, which plays notes in that same range. Klaus, do you know the real pedal notes on an organ?

I don't personally call the G three lines below the staff a "pedal G," and maybe not even call the F below it a "pedal F". Technically speaking, there is no "pedal range" officially recognized anywhere in tubadom, but in my experience, anything below that F 4 lines below the staff is commonly called the pedal range by most tuba players. But, of course, YMMV.

There is no set pedal range on the organ. While most of the stops are usually 8', 16' and 32', there are occasionally stops that are 4'. In organ literature, I have seen pedal passages that go up to the high g (3 lines above bass clef) somewhat commonly. I think pedal range was used more loosely than what you are hinting at.

Judging from the Grove Online article and the entry on the Trombone in Berlioz' Treatise, the term pedal tone was first applied to trombones and ophicleides (possibly even before the invention of the tuba). For trombones pedal tones was e to Bb (2 lines to 4 lines below BC).

Ultimately the point that everyone here has been arguing about is whether pedal tone is somewhat synonymous to 1st pitch of harmonic series or whether it relates to a set pitch. The first answer makes more sense if we take into account that all brass instruments use pedal tones.

[Donn]

Ultimately the point that everyone here has been arguing about is whether pedal tone is somewhat synonymous to 1st pitch of harmonic series or whether it relates to a set pitch. The first answer makes more sense if we take into account that all brass instruments use pedal tones.

Or to look at it the other way, it might seem particularly absurd to use a word that the rest of the world understands to mean "particularly low note", for the 1st partial of a trumpet.

I can't agree on the terms of the discussion, though. To my recollection, without reviewing the whole thread, the idea that it relates to a set (i.e., absolute) pitch was introduced in the post you just replied to. Most of the discussion has been about relative schemes, where the pedal tone range for a bass trombone would be different than for a tuba in any case.