So I don’t know a ton about music theory, but I’m curious about how this works. Why do our brains like to hear chords that are in tune? And how do we explain why something is tuned properly?
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It is difficult to say “why” we associate certain combinations of sounds with specific emotions – there are some theories that we have developed to get alerted by specific non-harmonious sounds, that may indicate the presence of predators, while other sounds – like birdsong – indicate no danger. Or at least we had an advantage in interpreting warning and/or “all clear”-sounds from other species… But to me this all sounds rather far-fetched.
Fact is, some of these combinations (like the perfect fourth or fifth) are perceived as harmonic, others (like the tritone) don’t immediately harmonize.
However, I would not agree that “some chords” don’t sound good: a crafty musician can make any chord sound “good”, by just putting it into the right context. This is admittedly easier for some chords than for others … or maybe it is just that most of us just have more experience with how to use, e.g. Am than something as harmonically complex as e.g. F#13b9.
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