As long as we're bringing up books on basic psychoacoustic (= perception 
of sound) theory, I can't help recommending "The Science of Musical 
Sound" by John R. Pierce (pub: Scientific American Library, ISBN: 
0-7167-1508-2).  This gives an extremely clear introduction to a lot of 
useful topics for computer music, including some of the questions in 
this thread. Some topics in the T.O.C: pitch, periodicity, resonance, 
scales, beating, consonance, Rameau's theories of harmony, loudness, 
masking, architectural acoustics, soud reproduction, analysis & 
synthesis, sonic illusions...

BTW, Reid, thanks for the cool info on the Hammond!

Check your library, or buy it if it's still in print. 

--PW

>From: "Reid Sweatman" 
>To: "CSound List" , 
>Subject: RE: [??theory] ambient music, harmony
>Date: Fri, 26 Jun 1998 10:20:43 -0700
>
>> Since I don't have a visacard to order those wonderful books on
>> computermusic over the net, I wonder if someone of you know some 
basic
>> methods to calculate harmonic freqs from a given freq....Assume I 
have
>> a sound with most emphasized freq is a 440Hz....Ok. Now I want to add
>> some other sound, how can i alter the sound's main pitch so that it
>> sounds harmonic with the previous sound ???
>
(snip)
>On a related tack, let me recommend two books you'll find very useful 
in
>regard to questions of this sort (I could recommend *lots* more , 
but
>these two are pretty well indispensable).  First,  "The Master Handbook 
of
>Acoustics," 3rd ed. by F. Alton Everest, ISBN 0-8306-4437-7.  Second, 
the
>Yamaha "Sound Reinforcement Handbook," by Gary Davis and Ralph Jones, 
ISBN
>0-88188-900-8.  They should be easy to come by (I found both at the 
local
>Barnes & Noble), and are around $35 each.  Hope this helps.
>
>Reid Sweatman
>Programmer/Audio Engineer
>
>
>


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The revised edition in paperback (1992) of the Pierce book is published by
W.H. Freeman and Co (ISBN: 07167-6005-3). I don't know if the Scientific
American Library version is still in print or not.

I also think that this book is an excellent introduction to acoustics and
psychoacoustics.

--Dan Hosken

At 8:29 PM -0700 6/26/98, Paul Winkler wrote:
>As long as we're bringing up books on basic psychoacoustic (= perception
>of sound) theory, I can't help recommending "The Science of Musical
>Sound" by John R. Pierce (pub: Scientific American Library, ISBN:
>0-7167-1508-2).
>Check your library, or buy it if it's still in print.