I was reading reddit yesterday, and someone asked a question :

I've noticed that Dr. Dre tunes all of his with a at 453.5Hz, I've heard of people tuning down to a 432Hz but not up,Why does he do that?

Someone provided an interesting answer, and it makes a lot of sense and I've never heard of someone doing that before. Anyhow, heres the reason they provided.

It has to do with ground hum at 60Hz in theU.S.A. Basically 60Hz
is somewhere between Bb and B and by tuning up to 453.5Hz or so you've
created something that will be in tune with the ground hum on speakers.

Anyhow I found this interesting, so I figured I'd share it on MusicalNet.
Dr. Dre is a pretty smart guy apparently.

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Re: Why Dr. Dre tunes A to 453hz
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to All on Sat Oct 04 2014 01:23 pm


I remember hearing about the Grateful Dead doing something similar. Their bassist, Phil Lesh, took classes ith the electronic composer Luciano Berio in college along ith their late 60s keyboardist Tom Constantenen. I've heard of tuning don to 432 as well, but it seems bizarre tuning anything to .3 hertz if you consider the overtones/harmonics.

I remember when I was younger I spent a while reading Herman Helmholtz' "On The Sensation Of Tone" and it mentions all sorts of technical stuff like the exact tuning of various pipe organs in Cathedrals across Europe. It also has a great deal of information on the microtonal content of human speech. He was a crazy german guy that essentially figured out a way to notate people talking. Harry Partch turned me on to the book.

Essentially, the 12 tone system is flawed because it is impossible to divide the octave evenly over several octaves. It can be done exactly with synthesizers/modulators, but not with stringed instruments. Harry Partch, whose music is incredibly bizarre, utilized an ancient greek scale of 43 tones. It's interesting because modern music theory of 12 tones by 7 degrees in a mode is essentially related to astrology; the seven planets known to the ancients and the 12 signs of the zodiac.

So, it's interesting to see Dr. Dre, of all people, is contributing to the progression of "just" intonation. Like, the reason pipe organs in different cathedrals are tuned differently may have to do with the inability of the craftsmen to be exact, but, it may be the opposite as well. The organs may be tuned according to the acoustics of the cathedral, so the organ/voices would resonate more fully. It only makes sense modern music would adapt in a similar way.

Or... Dr. Dre works for the KGB/Red Chinese and is utilizing mind tricks to brainwash people into buying his over priced headphones.

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Re: Why Dr. Dre tunes A to 453hz
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to All on Sat Oct 04 2014 13:23:44

I've noticed that Dr. Dre tunes all of his with a at 453.5Hz, I've heard of people tuning down to a 432Hz but not up,Why does he do that?

It has to do with ground hum at 60Hz in theU.S.A. Basically 60Hz
is somewhere between Bb and B and by tuning up to 453.5Hz or so you've created something that will be in tune with the ground hum on speakers.

I finally got time to look up some of the information that I was waiting on research time for, in order to study this a little better. I've been wondering about it for awhile, for unrelated reasons... Crazy shit like current A
tuning allegedly being made uniform by Nazis looking to subvert organized resistance amongst them through propagation via popular music, stuff like that. :) I first found the discrepancies amongst tunings I think when I was looking into some different diurnal beat stuff... Anyway, I thought it was kind of interesting in a crazy way, but not too worthy of wasting my time with.
So when I saw you bring this here, and since I've been spending a little more time with mathematical research lately, I thought I'd give it a peek. Bear with me that this is strictly a mathematical opinion, as I still haven't been working with music lately.
I'm making the assumption here that 'in tune with' is going to fall along the the lines of beginning at an octave (that is a harmonic of) X60Hz, wherein 'X' is an integer multiple, in order to remain along the harmonics of 60Hz. That would place different semitones (ie your flat, note, and sharp thereof) along the aforementioned octave at a ratio of 2^(1/12) frequency steps, to hit these magic points.
So the question is whether or not 453.5Hz falls on one of those magic increments. Unfortunately, I start work tomorrow, so I need to make sure that I get some shit done here. ;) I'll try actually working the problem when I've made some headway in increasing the efficiency of this place, and see whether or not I can validate the claim that you brought up. :)

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Re: Why Dr. Dre tunes A to 453hz
By: LaRRy LaGoMoRpH to All on Sat Oct 04 2014 13:23:44

I've noticed that Dr. Dre tunes all of his with a at 453.5Hz, I've heard of people tuning down to a 432Hz but not up,Why does he do that?

It has to do with ground hum at 60Hz in theU.S.A. Basically 60Hz
is somewhere between Bb and B and by tuning up to 453.5Hz or so you've created something that will be in tune with the ground hum on speakers.

Anyhow I found this interesting, so I figured I'd share it on
MusicalNet. Dr. Dre is a pretty smart guy apparently.

Interesting. My first thought is, doesn't each note have to be tuned to one specific frequency? I'd think the frequency is what defines a musical note, so tuning it slightly off would, by definition, change the note. Also, why just the A note? If he changes the tuning for just the A note, I'd think it would be out of tune with other notes, making combination notes sound slightly off. Why would it matter for it to be in tune with the ground hum of the speakers? Ideally, I'd think the speakers shouldn't hum.

Nightfox
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Re: Why Dr. Dre tunes A to 453hz
By: Nightfox to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sat Nov 01 2014 09:51:17

notes sound slightly off. Why would it matter for it to be in tune with the ground hum of the speakers? Ideally, I'd think the speakers shouldn't hum.

Yeah I'm pretty sure that insulating against that is going to be a primary concern of any decent speaker manufacturer. Also, wouldn't the transformer and amplification process (going through to DC as well as through capacitor banks) pretty much mute most of that even without specific engineering?
One of the nice things about 60Hz, though, is that it's pretty close to the specific frequencies used for acoustic weapons, due to the effect that it has on the CNS of humans (not sure about other animals). It can causing headache, nausea, disorientation, and all kinds of other shit when you get enough power behind it. So, basically, if you plug a sub that can handle it into the wall (probably with a little amperage limiting), you've got a speaker that'll keep a crowd of people at bay. ;)
Can't remember for sure, and I just woke up so I'm not feeling like googling, but I think the weaponry I'm thinking of is the 'LRAD' apparatus. Okay, I actually googled it. That's the one. Though it's touted as being at 2.5kHz. So maybe I need to shut the hell up. I know that I've heard 60Hz being touted as having significant bogus effects on humans, though. I'm gonna have to research this more when I don't have wage slavery awaiting me, as well, it appears.

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Re: Why Dr. Dre tunes A to 453hz
By: Nightfox to LaRRy LaGoMoRpH on Sat Nov 01 2014 09:51 am

Interesting. My first thought is, doesn't each note have to be tuned to one specific frequency? I'd think the frequency is what defines a musical note,

tuning it slightly off would, by definition, change the note. Also, why jus

t

the A note? If he changes the tuning for just the A note, I'd think it woul

d

be out of tune with other notes, making combination notes sound slightly off

.

Why would it matter for it to be in tune with the ground hum of the speakers

?

Ideally, I'd think the speakers shouldn't hum.

Yes, you are correct every note has to be tuned to a specific frequency, usually A440Hz is the standard reference pitch for most instruments because we are coming from a world with the piano as a reference instrument, and you can't retune a piano, you can retune a digital piano, and if you changed that parameter on an instrument it would 99 percent of the time show 440 as a starting value. If you have a digital tuner that's alright, it should have a calibrate function that also uses A as a reference. If you were to go into a music store should you be fortunate enough to find one that stocks a tuning fork, it will likely be A440, but you may be able to find one for middle C or E330, or maybe something else, I haven't gone shopping for tuning forks in literally forever.

So when I say Dr. Dre tunes A to 453.5, all the notes get changed relative to that. It's like if you tune your guitar relative to itself and it's tune, more or less, but your tuner might tell you its sharp or flat if you plug it in, or you try to play something pre-arranged with your keyboard or flute playing pal. So A440 is a standard that people stick to so all the instruments don't have to be tweeked. Depending on the tools you use to produce music you can make it a non-issue these days.

As far as speaker hum, I think I've experienced so much of it and damaged my hearing enough that I only am made aware of it when someone points it out otherwise I often chalk it up to echos of impending tinnitis. But it's there in my system a lot of times. I've wired up a lot of intricate systems and the hum usually finds it's way in. I'm not saying Dre has that issue or doesn't have the finest sound system, but there's people who would say to really make a hit single it's got to sound good in mono most of all. It's an important principle to get your stuff to sound good on the worst stuff, not awesome on the best stuff. Awesome on the best stuff = worse than average on the worst stuff often times. That's why there's people who can make good money just by mastering albums. There's also sorts of zen principles involved I only understand on a very superficial level.

hope that clears things up a bit, supercheers,


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