why are Do Re Mi Fa Sol La Si the standard notes?

706 viewsOtherPhysics

If you take an instrument without predefined notes, such as a trombone or a violin, you can produce an infinite amount of notes between Do and Re for example (applies with out of tunes instruments as well). With that logic, you could have an infinite set of 7 notes that are as evenly « spaced » as our current standard. Im sure im missing something obvious.

In: Physics

14 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Although what people said here about the harmonic series is true and that’s mostly why the major scale sounds the way it does, some cultures in the world do use notes between “do” and “re”. This is called microtonal music, you can find it very often in Arabic music. The microtonal theory is very complex and musicians learn how to use their instruments to get different microtones to hit different scales.

For more information about this you can look up Makam theory ( the Arabic version of scales, but very different approach)

You are viewing 1 out of 14 answers, click here to view all answers.