432 Hz

steevio · Post by **steevio** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 12:41 pm

guys did you know that we should all be tuning our synths etc. to A = 432 Hz and not 440Hz.
did you know that 440 Hz tuning was imposed by the Nazis in 1939, and previous to that concert tuning was in 432.
( i read somewhere that it was part of Nazi mass mind manipulation techniques, but i dont know how true that is )

432 Hz was discovered by the Greeks as being totally in tune with nature, (and i think is related to the speed of light, but dont quote me on that either)

stradovarius violins are tuned to 432, and many famous symphonies were composed in 432.

apparently when you tune music down so that A =432, the sound becomes much clearer to the human ear, and resonates with us.

Opuswerk · Post by **Opuswerk** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 12:47 pm

very interesting post.
How would you tune a vst to 432 Hz? simply by detuning it slightly?

lcvl · Post by **lcvl** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 12:55 pm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A440

Atheory · Post by **Atheory** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 1:10 pm

i read about this before, not sure about the nazis involvement, its more to do with standardised scales and the fractions they go up by (maybe they got to me too?)

also i think they did try the 432 Hz for a while, but it sounded kinda out of tune.

will find the link,thats all a bit vauge

Ingemar · Post by **Ingemar** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 1:39 pm

Opuswerk, most commersial level synths have advanced settings and there you can change the tuning amongst other things. If I'm not misstaken 440hz is considered A4 (where C3 is the keyhole C) but I'm really not good at this, but it's an easy parameter to change anyway. Some synths, like Octopus for instance, comes with different national tunings so you can get typically arabic or indian sounding scales with it (pentatonic and whatnot).

Now I'm gonna dig in on that wikipedia article, and regardless of nazi involvment in this matter it could be a cool trademark to have your main synths tuned a few herz away from the standard. I'm definitely going to experiment with it for a bit

Ingemar · Post by **Ingemar** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 1:52 pm

the article was definitely worth reading, the part about pitch inflation was hilarious. I'm going to experiment with automating the pitch for the main synth for a bit in my latest track, see if I can make it more "bright and clear" for the climactic parts

. Also reading up on the tritone paradox was quite inspiring.

upekah · Post by **upekah** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 2:15 pm

This is really interesting!

Thanks Steevio

Opuswerk · Post by **Opuswerk** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 2:17 pm

Carl Smart wrote:the article was definitely worth reading, the part about pitch inflation was hilarious. I'm going to experiment with automating the pitch for the main synth for a bit in my latest track, see if I can make it more "bright and clear" for the climactic parts . Also reading up on the tritone paradox was quite inspiring.

What article are you talking about?