continued…

Since each human being is slightly different on a small-scale structure different pitches are likely to be more easily identified and assimilated by different individuals. I have spoken with musicians that claim they like the sound of one note or key more than others. And there is the backlog of composers that love to identify specific keys with specific emotions or concepts. I have also observed that some musicians can identify some pitches easier than others. It would be interesting to get a physiologist or ear specialist to do some work in this area.

Another issue is of course the mental process of integration that happens after the ear does its work. Even if the hearing apparatus is functioning properly a human mind must understand the information it is receiving. A psychologically happy person with a relatively low level of intelligence (or musical understanding) may only understand and appreciate music with simple ratios relationships, while a person with more intelligence (or musical understanding) may be bored with such music and desire more complex ratios. A psychologically unhappy person may desire to hear minor chords in a piece of music because those chords involve more dissonant ratios. A psychologically disturbed or unhealthy person might desire to hear very dissonant intervals and ratios that are too complex to hear, distinguish and comprehend because it matches their mental state. This probably accounts for much modern classical music and ugly noise that has been erroneously termed “music”. However, before I digress too far, I remind myself and those interested in creating and understanding actual music, ratios that are consistently applicable to a healthy human mind and hearing apparatus are my main concern in this essay. Again, I refer the interested reader to Rand’s Romantic Manifesto for a more thorough analysis of psycho-epistemological issues in music (and other arts).

While there are in fact general known principles to apply as well as new principles yet to discover, there are, of course, many more possible concrete applications of these principles. The musical universe is not limited by the number and type of ratios that will consistently serve the purpose of creating good music. As ever, it is only limited by the imagination of composers and musicians engaged in finding new and different creative solutions within the context of the nature of the human mind and ear.