Ambiguities of the Note in Music
What is a Note?
A note in music is at least known to be mentioned in different contexts within music theory. For one, it can be used to discuss “notes on a standard Western classical piano keyboard,” that is to see the (mechanical) keys (refer to 20241013160314-Ambiguities_of_the_Key_in_Music) on a given instrument or medium by which various sounds may be triggered, effectuated, etc. (This is exemplified in 20240831183733-Semitones.) Yet, clearly, musical notes are not reducible to (mechanical) keys, as the word “note” also makes its appearance in the context of discussions about normative mechanical keys, such as when using the musical alphabet:
Notes as Keys
Provisionally, just as was done in 20240831183733-Semitones, we will take “notes¨–as used to discuss the main sound-toggling parts of a piano’s keyboard–to mean “keys,¨ as “keys¨ is conventionally what the main sound-toggling parts of a piano keyboard are called. Since this is building up to a notation system, however, I will continue to specify these keys to be properly-tuned, i.e. set to the correct relative auditory frequencies.
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So, just like what happens with keys where the ideal, desired, preferred, “telic,” etc., sound of a given (mechanical) key lead to a sense of a “key” as a normative mechanical key, the word “note” follows suit insofar as, when the musical alphabet is specified, a conventional set of pitches or frequencies of sound are already in-place for the (mechanical) keys of a given instrument:
A Key as a Normative Mechanical Key
However, our definition of “mechanical key¨ reveals that labeling a series of mechanical keys, as with the musical alphabet and accidentals on the standard Western classical piano, is not enough for the replicability of given configurations of sound, and thus the transfer of skills in sound manipulation. The mechanical key can have varied implementations. Implicit, then, in music instruction using the practical reference to mechanical keys is the reliability and consistency of its implementation in accord with the factors relevant to music performance and production. So the word “key¨ sometimes refers to mechanical key and other times refers to certain related phenomena in music performance.
In addition, at the same time, as soon as one starts giving mechanical keys labels, as in the musical alphabet and its accidentals (refer to 20240831190951-Musical_Alphabet & 20240831200842-Musical_Accidentals), it allows one to talk about aspects of musical production or performance independent of the given implementation of mechanical keys to some degree.
So, on the one hand, music instruction requires replicability through the reliability and consistency of the implementation of mechanical keys, yet on the other hand music instruction requires abstraction of any given implementation of mechanical keys for musical discourse. The word “key¨ can therefore shift to mean an ideal or normative mechanical key.
A “key,¨ and consequently music in general, in such a case, can only be known or can only be an object of knowledge if certain aspects or parameters of sound are specifically selected to be isolated for purposes of control in the implementation of a series of mechanical keys, and these control-delegated isolated aspects of sound exist along a shared dimension such that they can be ordered and compared. This could be ordered and compared in absolute or relative terms.
Musical Epistemology and Normative Mechanical Keys
In the standard Western classical piano, the aspect, feature or parameter of sound chosen for control purposes was the pressure frequency of air responsible for differences in auditory quality. The frequency of sound can be measured, and thereby compared and ordered, along a dimension that all sounds share. However, as it is not possible to discretely convey every possible frequency level of sound through mechanical keys (and it would not be useful to do so anyway since some frequencies may be inaudible), consistency and reliability is not just achieved by using sonic frequency as a standard object of control. In this case it is achieved by additionally setting a standard pattern in the frequency relationship among selected sonic frequencies. So, what is needed for musical knowledge to be possible is the following:
- A sensory experience that changes in a way correlative to the frequency/amplitude of an air medium or a frequency in or scale of an air-related event in time; it seems clear that music has something to do with sound, which has this nature.
- A standard object of control that is some dimension of sound (i.e., measurable, ordered, comprised of possible directions and thereby comparable); we see, for example, that an oscillator detune knob (refer to 20240901112354-Oscillator_Detune_Kob) adjusts the sonic frequency of a sound, and so that is its object of control.
- A conventional starting or reference point in the given dimension that is the standard object of control; this is seen in the concept of middle C or C4 (refer to 20240901142025-Middle_C) in Western music theory and the process of tuning on A5 (refer to 20240901153645-Musical_Octaves & 20240901143827-Pitch_of_Middle_C).
- Standardization of repetitive, patterned or proportional relationships across the dimension (i.e., among points along the dimension) that is the standard object of control for sound, at some level of resolution, emphasized or chosen due to the perceptual and sensory qualities they correlate with; we see this with the concept of intervals as well as consonance/dissonance (refer to 20240901171406-Musical_Intervals & 20240901160833-Consonance,_Dissonance_and_Sound_Frequency_Ratios).
- An implementation of a sequence of mechanical keys based on 1-4 (refer to 20240904103821-Musical_Scale_and_Key_Patterns).
Note
This means that, in theory, there can be music knowledge unrelated to sonic frequency, but to other aspects of sound.
A “key¨ thus can refer to a normative mechanical key, normative because it was created with a standard object of control that is dimensional, it has repetitive, patterned or proportional relationships with other points along that dimension, and its sound is able to be located along that dimension due to a selected fixed sonic reference point on that dimension.
The existence of a normative mechanical key is what allows labeling of mechanical keys to facilitate musical discourse and thereby produce musical knowledge. That is to say, mechanical keys are described as “C¨, “D¨, etc., according to what normative mechanical key they are.
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In other words, insofar as notes can be used to refer to keys, they begin to mimic the “speciation,” so to speak, of the meaning of musical key. Notes, insofar as keys are concerned, can thus also be said to ultimately refer to normative mechanical keys but also be capable of referring to either (mechanical) keys as such, or otherwise to the pitches or frequencies conventionally enlisted for such (mechanical) keys.
The Note Beyond the Key
However, the meaning of the word “note” in music also goes beyond the meaning of the word “key,” as it includes something more. For example, there is a common practice in music called music notation or musical notation, which involves the use of symbols and syntactic rules for their use to transcribe the development of a given music performance. Within this practice, the symbols in use, particularly those that convey pitch/frequency or duration, are known as “notes.” Naturally, this draws on the musical alphabet and their accidentals, but can also find itself in the context of the roman numeral system of chord notation. Or, even more obviously, in the use of rhythmic symbols across staves determinant of their pitch.