20
HARMONY AND TUNING
Theory aside, the best way to get great sound
is to experiment with all of Quintet' possible
harmony modes. Not only will you develop an
intuitive sonic sense of what works best where,
but by investigating different permutations and
combinations you could discover some delight-
ful sounds you might otherwise have missed.
responsibility to try to sing the melody as close
to the tuning of a piano (equal temperament)
as possible. The other singers must then tune
their harmonies to the melody, using “just rela-
tive intonation”. The Quintet is able to do this in
both the Just
and Barbershop tuning modes.
When the Just
or Barbershop Modes are
selected in the Quintet, the harmony tunings
are based on the following relationships:
Minor 3rd = 3 cycles for every 4 cycles of the
input
Major 3rd = 5 cycles for every 4 cycles of the
input
5th = 3 cycles for every 2 cycles of the input.
Barbershop
differs from Just tuning in Chordal
mode. Just tuning will use the root of the chord
for the tuning reference, while Barbershop tun-
ing uses the input notes as the tuning refer-
ence. For this reason it is better to use
Barbershop in an a-cappella situation and Just
when playing with other instruments, because
Just tuning sounds more in-tune with the other
instruments that most likely have equal tem-
perament tuning.
Our best advice is to experiment and use your
ears!
Just Tuning
Why just tuning? Although probably no one
has ever told you this, your expensive grand
piano and the last great keyboard synthesizer
you bought are both out of tune! Well, to be
fair we can say instead that they are all tuned
using Equal
temperament.
Harmony is the result of the interaction
between differing audible frequencies in ratios
that sound musical to the human ear. A more
exact ratio leads to a nicer sounding harmony.
Most instruments (like the piano) are absolute
by nature. Each note on the keyboard has a
specific pitch. Equal temperament tuning uses
approximations for the tuning of each note,
allowing us to easily alter the key of our music
without re-tuning our instruments.
Unfortunately, with this method of tuning we
lose the ability to create perfect ratios when
playing multiple notes. As a result, much of the
harmony you’ve heard in music has not been
perfectly in tune!
The bottom line is that the approximations of
equal temperament tuning are practical, but
imperfect. Using the Quintet with Just tuning
will definitely expand your musical horizons!
Just tuning is the practice of maintaining the
relative (and perfect) ratios between pitches,
creating perfect harmonies.
Singers, especially when performing multi-part
a-cappella music, base their tuning on how it
harmonically sounds with other singers. The
natural tendency, and what sounds best, is to
sing with “just tuning” so that beating is mini-
mized. One of the goals in barbershop quartet
singing is to strive for “just relative intonation”
so that a sub-frequency is audible. Achieving
this goal results in what barbershop fans often
describe as the coveted "ring and lock" sound.
In barbershop music it is the lead singer's
