Books › A descriptive catalogue of the musical instruments recently exhibited at the Royal Military Exhibition, London, 1890 …, 1891 › scan 255
Scan 255
A descriptive catalogue of the musical instruments recently exhibited at the Royal Military Exhibition, London, 1890 …, 1891
11 lines. Read by computer on 1 October 2026. Printed page 235. See the scan on archive.org.
1APPENDIX.
3AN ESSAY ON MUSICAL PITCH.
4By D. J. Blaikley.
6THE examination and comparison of a number of instruments made at different times and in different countries, and designed with reference to different scale systems, bring into prominence the question of musical pitch. Indeed, some consideration of it cannot be neglected or ignored if a confusion of ideas is to be avoided as regards the objects aimed at by the makers of, and performers upon, the instruments described in this Catalogue.
8The "pitch" of a note is its position, high or low, in the whole range of sound, and can only be definitely determined by measuring the frequency of the vibrations causing that note; in this country it is reckoned according to the number of double or complete vibrations, or swings to and fro, per second. Although it is only of recent years that accurate means have been devised for measuring vibrational values, it must be remembered that the sense and perception of pitch, both relative and absolute, may, and does, exist in a high degree, without any conscious knowledge of vibrations; it still remains, however, that the difference of vibrational values, as manifested by beats, is the readiest and most accurate means of determining slight departures from consonance, even to the highly-trained ear.
10The pitch of a note as determined by the measurement of its vibrational frequency is, for the sake of distinction, called its "absolute pitch"; its relationship to a given standard, or to other notes in its own scale, is its "relative pitch." We may with propriety speak of a sound as being low or high, apart from any idea of a standard pitch, accordingly as our ears tell us that it lies towards one extreme or the other, either of our total range of hearing, or of the total range of some particular instrument; but when we say that it
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