Abstract
THE author points out that music in past ages has developed “without benefit of physics, except in so far as the simple rules of Pythagoras gave support to certain musical intervals against possible changes in taste, or style . . .” In this book an account is given of modern developments arising from successful efforts to improve the transmission of music and speech. The two chief factors are pitch and frequency, the latter here denoted in the title as cycles; and intensity and loudness, indicated by ‘bels'. If one sound is ten times as loud as another, it is one ‘beF higher in sound level. If A is about 25 per cent louder than B, then A is one ‘decibel’ (db.) above B. The necessity for some such scheme arises from the fact that a full orchestra may vary in sound energy from about 70 watts down to a few microwatts, with a ratio of ten million to one, so that a logarithmic notation is required, and in this particular case the range is clearly 7 bels, or 70 decibels.
A Fugue in Cycles and Bels
By John Mills. Pp. vii + 269. (London: Chapman and Hall, Ltd., 1936.) 13s. 6d. net.
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A Fugue in Cycles and Bels. Nature 137, 802 (1936). https://doi.org/10.1038/137802a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/137802a0