Timbre & Articulation

This lesson is part of the Fundamentals of Sound & Music module.

Objectives

• Student will be able to notate and interpret/define various articulation symbols.
• Students will be familiar with ADSR sound envelopes and their components.
• Student will be able to relate different aspects of the attack envelope with perceived articulation and/or dynamic.
• Student will understand the relationship between pitch, loudness, and timbre.
• Student will be able to derive the harmonics for specific wave shapes given a fundamental frequency (triangle, sawtooth, square).

Resources

Readings

• T. Rush. "Dynamics and Articulations." (Music Theory for Musicians and Normal People).
• "Wave Shapes" (Smack my Pitch Up)
• "Envelope." (Smack my Pitch Up)
• "Envelopes." (Music Technology Musician)
• "Timbre." (Music Technology Musician)

Tools

• Vienna Symphonic Library Instrumentology: Individual instrument examples for illustrations of articulations
• Chrome Music Lab Oscillators
• ADSR Envelope Simulation
• Chrome Music Lab: Spectrogram
• Academo Virtual Oscilloscope
• (Software) Audacity
• Teropa Harmonics Explorer

Class Activities

• Discussion and definition of ADSR envelope with demo.
• Illustration of articulation with different instruments, comparison of oscilloscope/spectrogram with ADSR envelope graph.
• Alteration of harmonics for various wave shapes (demo).
• Visualization of timbre changes on spectrogram/oscilloscope.