Talk:Tone

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We need to clear up usage of this word in music:

  1. the interval of a major second, 2 semitones, etc
  2. the nature and quality of a music sound: what distinguishes different types of musical instruments and what makes a good instrument (eg Steinways tend to have a very good tone -- well, mine does ;) )
  3. used (in AmEng, I think) to mean a musical note: eg "each key of the piano produces a seperate tone"

personally, I would like to see #3 changed to "note" or "musical note", or "pitch" if speaking scientifically.

There's a difference between "note" and "pitch"... the plot thickens ;) -- Tarquin

My thoughts:

  1. is the most "proper" use of the word. There isn't really an alternative word for this in music.
  2. is tricky - when talking about the characteristics of a pitched sound, the word "timbre" is more usual, but then again nobody talks about a piano having a "good timbre" (at least I don't).
  3. here "tone" means the actual sound of the note, not the letter name (G, B flat, F sharp, whatever), so a reference to "pitch" is more appropriate than one to "musical note." But I'm English, and I don't know what NAmericans mean here. --Camembert
usually, tone means something scientific and isn't used by itself. ie, a sine wave is referred to as a pure tone, the sound we here on the phone is the dial tone, etc. JFQ

"pitch" is the actual frequency of the sound. The note "E" can be at very different pitches, depending on the tuning scheme, whether the instrument is in tune or not, which pitch has been chosen as A (conert pitch etc) -- and then other considerations such as the ambient temperature. -- Tarquin

Hm, you're right. Maybe what's needed here are quick references to "note", "pitch" and "timbre" (although how we get an article out of the latter I'm not sure) and then either an article here about the interval of a major second or else a reference across to an article "whole tone" (where you can talk about the major second, the whole tone scale, etc). --Camembert


I figured we can use a little bit of natural disambiguation: the interval "tone" can be explained on semitone. pitch is a huge disambiguation list with a pitch (music) link which isnt written yet.

I have to say, I don't like having the idea of a whole tone being subjugated to the semitone entry. It seems like it and the whole tone scale deserve their own entry.JFQ
Whole tone scale is needed, yes. What I meant is that the page tone already has a long disambiguation list. "tone (music)" would pretty much be a stub article, same as semitone. It seemed a good idea to gather them together on an article page with an unambiguous name.
Thinking about it a little more, and all of this discussion, along with microtonality, probably belongs in the tuning entry. I haven't even looked at that one yet, I'm a little scared.JFQ
Yup, the tuning entry is scary. Part of the problem is that writers disagree on a) the names of a particular scheme, and b) what is meant by a particular name. It'a tangle. I suggested that we merge all the pages named for tuning schemes onto a single page as a temporary measure, until we resolve it all, so we can see at a glance the state of play. bon courage! -- Tarquin
Agreed. The current mess is almost completely unmanagable from the looks of it.JFQ

[edit] Disputed links

I disagree with adding the four links below back in, per WP:DISAMBIGUATION. Here's why:

  • Tone control circuits doesn't sound like something that would ever be a reasonable target for someone searching for simply "tone." Per the above link, entries are not supposed to be included on a disambiguation page simply because their title happens to include the disambiguated word.
  • Per Manual of Style (disambiguation pages), each entry is advised to have only one wikilink, hence why I removed the links to sepia tone and duotone.
  • Tone (signal) just redirects to Pitch (music) which is already covered. Whether it should redirect there, I don't know, but it does, and that page doesn't seem to have anything to do with electronics, and there never seems to have been an article at Tone (signal) according to its history. If there was, it's been deleted.

Propaniac 02:28, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

  • Tone control circuits would describe the control labeled "Tone" on a radio.. when I disambig'd pages pointing here, there were a number where that was the appropriate entry.
  • I'm ambiguous about duotone and sepia tone, they seem like they would be useful to have and yet are very much related to Photographic print toning. If they need to be separate lines, that would work for me.
  • I've removed Tone (signal) since it's a redirect. It probably should not be based on the description associated with it here.
-- Upholder 04:57, 30 August 2007 (UTC)