# Octaves for Dummies (meaning me) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 9, 2015, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111 "2015-06-09T23:29:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/21 "2015-06-10T01:08:26Z")
^ **fachverwirrt** , I thank you; well said. ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/22 "2015-06-10T01:22:22Z")
Check this guy out. Would routinely cover four and a half octaves without apparent effort. If anyone here likes music, this is a must-hear. ---
**Author:** ![zombywoof](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/9e8a1a/32.png) [@zombywoof](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zombywoof)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/23 "2015-06-10T01:22:50Z")
> [@vivalostwages](#): > > Interesting–thanks. I was curious about Sam Smith, whom I used to think sang in falsetto but apparently doesn’t (and he has stated such). People seem divided over whether he’s a tenor or baritone. ? > > [forummotions.com](http://therangeplace.forummotions.com/t2765-sam-smith?highlight=sam+smith) I’m not familiar with him - and note there is overlap between the ranges…I’m not sure the definitions matter so much for pop singers as they do for, say, opera singers, where roles are written with specific voice types in mind - but I’d guess the guy here with “fach” in his username knows a lot more than I do 😉 ---
**Author:** ![standingwave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@standingwave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/standingwave)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/24 "2015-06-10T01:52:03Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > Due to the way our hearing works, we hear tones at octave intervals as being the “same” in some respect. We can hear the difference in pitch of course, but there is a sense in which we think of them as the same note. Which seems to me to be the mechanism behind the [Shepard tone](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard_tone), the illusion of a tone that continually ascends or descends in pitch, also described as a “sonic barber’s pole”. - The twelfth tone would then be the same as the first, and the cycle could continue indefinitely. (In other words, each tone consists of two sine waves with **frequencies separated by octaves** ; the intensity of each is a gaussian function of its separation in semitones from a peak frequency, which in the above example would be B.)\* Examples: Falling: [https://youtu.be/u9VMfdG873E](https://youtu.be/u9VMfdG873E) Rising: [https://youtu.be/5rzIiF7LpPU](https://youtu.be/5rzIiF7LpPU) ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Pearse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/richard_pearse/32/13144_2.png) [@Richard\_Pearse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Pearse)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/25 "2015-06-10T02:25:54Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > I think that (and the rest of the post) is probably more complicated than ‘8 consecutive (white) keys on a piano’ to someone that says ‘I’ve heard of an octave, but what is it?’ An important aspect that seemed to have been missed, but that was covered by Strangelove, is that an octave is heard as fundamentally the same note. ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 3:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/26 "2015-06-10T03:17:20Z")
> [@zombywoof](#): > > I’m not familiar with him - and note there is overlap between the ranges…I’m not sure the definitions matter so much for pop singers as they do for, say, opera singers, where roles are written with specific voice types in mind - but I’d guess the guy here with “fach” in his username knows a lot more than I do 😉 Just don’t look up “verwirrt”, or your confidence in me might well be shattered.🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/27 "2015-06-10T04:11:55Z")
> [@standingwave](#): > > Which seems to me to be the mechanism behind the [Shepard tone](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard_tone), the illusion of a tone that continually ascends or descends in pitch, also described as a “sonic barber’s pole”. Yep, the individual notes count up–A, B, C, etc.–but they fade in the previous octave gradually, such that by the time you reach the end of the sequence, you are actually back to the beginning. You can tell what’s happening if you listen closely, but if you don’t know how the trick works, it really sounds like it’s continually increasing in pitch and yet somehow not getting anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/28 "2015-06-10T04:18:15Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#): > > What? No. > > The chart that you linked (which should be taken for general purposes only) shows a full tenth overlap between bass and tenor. Tenors should be able to sing easily and without strain to at least C2, preferably A2. Basses should be able to sing at least an E4, preferably F4. That’s a lot of overlap. Speaking as an enthusiastic amateur singer , that chart looks bloody optimistic on the girls’ side. Altos singing between a c3 and a g5?? Yeah _if_ a good singer _and_ trained _and_ well-warmed-up…maybe. Last time I was involved in musical theatre, admittedly with a moderately restricted pool of participants, we range-tested everyone and found two women who could reliably sing a g5. Out of 30. Sopranos, of course. Everyone else capped out at D or E. I don’t think I personally know any women who could reliably hit both g5 and c3. And tenors only do two octaves? Surely not! Tenors are great singers, on the whole. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 4:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/29 "2015-06-10T04:27:32Z")
An easy octave if you have a guitar is the first and sixth strings. E4 and E2 a two octave jump If you or a friend has a guitar pluck the two outside strings and you’ll hear what a note two octaves apart sounds like. E3 is 2nd fret on the D string. Just in the open position on the guitar, there is a three octave range. btw, my digital tuner displays this information. 😉 I don’t have it memorized. LOL I rarely need to know the exact octave range of a note. But it is useful in finding guitar notes on a piano. I can use the chart that I linked earlier to find and play the same E4 my guitar plays. I’m not trained on the piano but can hunt and peck the notes of a melody I’m learning to sing. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 4:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/30 "2015-06-10T04:44:34Z")
> [@vivalostwages](#): > > See the first couple minutes here: > > Is the older fellow singing in more than one octave? No. He’s doing a 5-note (do-re-mi-fa-sol-fa-me-re-do) vocal warmup. By the end (the fifth scale), he gets up to a B quite shakily. If he did one more scale starting on the next note up, the high note (the fifth note he sings) would have been an octave up from the first note he sang on the first scale. Anyhow, you know the classic song “Somewhere Over the Rainbow”? The two notes in “Somewhere” are one octave apart. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 5:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/31 "2015-06-10T05:35:29Z")
Talking of one octave jumps… _Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday to you, Happy Biiiirth…_ Yep, that’s it. ---
**Author:** ![Your\_Great\_Darsh\_Face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ac8455/32.png) [@Your\_Great\_Darsh\_Face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Your_Great_Darsh_Face)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/32 "2015-06-10T12:55:21Z")
It’s also an octave from the _first_ note in “The Star-Spangled Banner” to the _highest_, although - and this also makes it challenging for most ordinary singers - there is a leap of a major tenth mid-song. “The Londonderry Air” also has a range of a twelfth (as does TSSB), and so does “We Plough The Fields and Scatter”, while “Old Man River” spans a thirteenth. No commonly-sung song ranges as wide as three octaves, though - although Minnie Riperton, for one, would have been able to manage it with room to spare; she could hit _four_ (and pronounce lyrics at the top end of it too, which is very rare indeed). ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/33 "2015-06-10T18:01:54Z")
> [@zombywoof](#): > > I’m not familiar with him - and note there is overlap between the ranges…I’m not sure the definitions matter so much for pop singers as they do for, say, opera singers, where roles are written with specific voice types in mind - but I’d guess the guy here with “fach” in his username knows a lot more than I do 😉 Here is a brief Sam sampler…his acoustic version of “Latch”: Is he changing octaves at 2:10 ("CHEST") and at 2:46 ("got" stretched out into several syllables) ? At the beginning of his Bruno Mars cover, you can hear his speaking voice. Is it high-pitched? (Just trying to get a handle on all these terms.) [![]( " - YouTube") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZIrzWcoCoU) ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/34 "2015-06-10T18:27:02Z")
On “chest” he’s rising a fifth. On “got” he is stretching an octave from the lowest to highest note. By the way, he is unambiguously a tenor. Anyone who thinks otherwise doesn’t know what they’re talking about. And he’s definitely singing in falsetto several times, notable at 1:18, whatever he may say. It may be a “reinforced” falsetto, but it’s a falsetto. ---
**Author:** ![amarinth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3be4f8/32.png) [@amarinth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/amarinth)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/35 "2015-06-10T18:34:22Z")
> [@vivalostwages](#): > > Is he changing octaves at 2:10 (“CHEST”) and at 2:46 (“got” stretched out into several syllables) ? “changing octaves” doesn’t really make sense in that sentence. At 2:10, “chest” is a fifth higher than “my” (a fifth is less than an octave). But I think what you’re focusing on is that he’s producing the sound differently. And that switch makes the word “chest” sound really high, and different, and strange as compared to the words that came before it. At 2:46, he does begin the word “got” an octave lower than he ends it, and he does that same switch in the way that he’s producing the sound mid-word. But I still probably wouldn’t call it “changing octaves.” ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 7:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/36 "2015-06-10T19:22:37Z")
What he’s switching, by the way, is _[registers](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vocal_register)_. That may be part of the confusion. Singers (especially pop singers) often switch registers when they jump an octave, but it’s not (always) necessary. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/37 "2015-06-10T21:29:33Z")
> [@Dr.Strangelove](#): > > A simpler explanation (and not limited to a particular scale) is that an octave represents a factor of 2 difference in frequency. > > Every note has a single center frequency. For instance, “middle A” typically has a frequency of 440 Hz (but this can vary–the exact number is not important). The next A, one octave up, would then have a frequency of 880 Hz, and then next one 1760 Hz. In the other direction, we have 220 Hz and 110 Hz. These are all the same basic note but at different octaves. > > Due to the way our hearing works, we hear tones at octave intervals as being the “same” in some respect. We can hear the difference in pitch of course, but there is a sense in which we think of them as the same note. > > The other notes fall between these intervals, but the same basic principle applies. For example, B might be at 494 Hz, with the next octave up at 988 Hz, then 1976 Hz, and so on. How far apart are the different notes and their variations (sharp, flat, etc.)? Is any sound someone can sing some sort of note? ---
**Author:** ![Frylock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ce7236/32.png) [@Frylock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frylock)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/38 "2015-06-10T21:35:43Z")
> [@fachverwirrt](#): > > By the way, he is unambiguously a tenor. Anyone who thinks otherwise doesn’t know what they’re talking about. And he’s definitely singing in falsetto several times, notable at 1:18, whatever he may say. It may be a “reinforced” falsetto, but it’s a falsetto. Is this some kind of debate people have about his voice or something? It seems clear to me too that it is unambiguously tenor, and that “chest” is a clear case of falsetto. Others disagree?! ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/39 "2015-06-10T21:55:13Z")
> [@gigi](#): > > How far apart are the different notes and their variations (sharp, flat, etc.)? Is any sound someone can sing some sort of note? In the standard tuning system that most modern western music uses (called _equal temperament_) the notes are separated by a factor of the twelfth root of two. (Ya rly.) The reason is because each octave is a doubling of frequency, as mentioned above, and due to complicated historical reasons, each octave is now divided into 12 notes (including sharps and flats (the black keys.)) So if you start at middle A at 440Hz, and multiply it by the twelfth root of two 12 times, you get to the next A at 880Hz and all the notes in between. You can certainly sing (or tune an instrument) to any frequency you want that may or may not be on the “standard” scale. But it will sound bad unless all the other instruments are tuned the same way. That’s why there’s a standard. ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [June 10, 2015, 10:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111/40 "2015-06-10T22:07:21Z")
> [@Frylock](#): > > Is this some kind of debate people have about his voice or something? > > It seems clear to me too that it is unambiguously tenor, and that “chest” is a clear case of falsetto. Others disagree?! I wouldn’t have thought so; I was just responding to **vivalostwages** ’s question in post 17. The link in that post leads to a thread where several people are debating it. ETA: This is the first time I’ve heard of Sam Smith. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/octaves-for-dummies-meaning-me/722111.md?page=3)