Ill start by saying that my verbal intelligence is actually much better than my mathematical intelligence.

I like reading books about math more than reading an actual math textbook. So, yours is the kind of book that I really eat up. Being more uent/eloquent with words instead of numbers, Ill tend to focus more on the verbal aspects of your work rather than the mathematical, as you are clearly competent with the mathematics. At the same time, Ill do my best to not to be brutally pedantic on grammar issues. However, the natural language compiler in my brain threw an error once during the preface, so let me get it out of my system right now, and Ill do my best to avoid this tedious stu after this point. The algorithm that is most frequently used to retrieve data from music is the fast Fourier transform (FFT), an expedited modication of the discrete Fourier transform (DFT). Here you point out that the FFT is computed more quickly than the O(n2 ) version of the DFT. However in using the phrase expedited modication, expedited is acting as a modier of modication, not as a modier of computation time, which is what you mean to say. Ok, end of aspergerishly pedantic commentary. Lets begin!

Chapter 1, Math Review

For this chapter, you have to strike a balance - explain things enough, but not too much. And its really hard to divine where those lines are exactly. Heres a quote from the chapter: Likewise, its antiderivative or integral ex dx is equal to ex , plus an undened constant. So when you say, plus an undened constant does that then beg the question from the beginner why does that happen? And if so should you explain it? Or if you see the explanation as not being necessary, then should you just omit that fact so it doesnt bring up questions to the reader that are not answered in the book? This is just one example of the balancing act, and I myself would have to think long and hard about each example and whats actually the best decision for each case. Im sure youve ripped out enough hair doing just that, so Ill spare myself for now.

Chapter 2, Physical Sound

We can recognize the instrumentation, modality, artist, genre,... Using modality assumes a pretty sophisticated understanding of music theory, whereas the other terms are well known. There is no section that discusses modality [edit: yes there is!], so you could consider including this information somewhere else in the book (another chapter or appendix), point the reader here to an outside 1

reference, or just omit the word (unless you dont mind the reader taking it upon themselves to put the book down to consult wikipedia). (Ah ok, you mention modality later. Good!) You use partials a few times in this chapter, and maybe I missed it, but I dont think its dened beforehand. (Ok you mention it later!) A standard way of measuring the reverberation of an acoustic space is by calculating the RT60, the time that a sound (typically wide-band or narrowband noise) takes to decay by 60 decibels in that space. Should wideband and narrowband both have hyphens? Theorem: For any real numbers a, b (element of) R I know you talk about the real and complex sets in the rst chapter, but did you dene the element symbol? No light is present in a vacuum (pg 43)? I thought because light is an electromagnetic wave that it can travel in a vacuum, but because sound is just molecular vibrations that it cannot travel in a vacuum? Maybe dene what a partial derivative is (pg 44)?

Chapter 3, Musical Sound

In music, pitch follows tuning standards to regulate instrument construction and eschew tedious debates that arise when playing with other musicians. I tend to think of eschew as meaning avoid using, not just avoid as used here. Maybe mitigate (help stop, as I understand it) would work better here? Incidentally, you are good about not going out of your way to use a ten dollar word when an everyday one will work just ne - something certain academics are guilty of. I like the phrase eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation. Although eschew as used in this phrase just means avoid....so I dont know fuck this shit. we can build the circle by moving up a fth twelve times until we reach the enharmonic equivalent of the original note Do you dene enharmonic equivalent somewhere? (ok you dene it later!) Equal temperament has more advantages over all other temperings of the 12-note Western scale because... Not so says Ross Dun! Apparently, the inventors of the just intonation tuning system disagreed. Who are the inventors? Is it known?

Chapter 4, Musical Instruments

It is one of the few musical instruments whose paradigm is early on in its invention... Maybe this is how you meant to phrase things, but Im not sure what you mean. Maybe whose paradigm was codied early on in its invention? When the violin is bowed, the sand drifts away from places of high vibration, which are locations of the instruments nodes. I thought the locations of largest compression/rarefaction (or high vibration) were the anti-nodes?

The change in the movement of the traveling waves in a wind instrument can be modeled as 90 out of phase with the change in pressure waves (again referring to Fig. 4.21), wherein the variation of motion is greatest at the mouthpiece for all of the instruments while the change in pressure is zero. Is 4.21 supposed to be 4.15 here? 4.21 plots the frequency response of a snare drum... Plot the Bessel functions dude! far more highly harmonic than the frequency spectra viols or pianos. Should there be an of between spectra and viols? Dmitri Shostakovichs Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op. 47: II. Allegreto. Should there be two ts in allegreto?

Chapter 5, Auditory Perception

This means that the basilar membrane functions like a Fourier device. What is a Fourier device? the meatus or auditory canal, lol meatus Exploding head syndrome is another form of auditory hallucination The Shepard tone is an auditory illusion much like the optical illusion a spinning barbers pole. Of a spinning barbers pole? How do you pronounce phons and sones? Maybe dene lossy? (ok you do later!) Reinier Plomp experimented with the audibility of lol plomp I always imagine the months that make up the year as being an ellipse viewed from like 45 degrees from directly overhead. Not as cool as your number thing though, or in any way like synesthesia, but oh well. Two cool things I know about auditory perception that could be added to this chapter: The missing fundamental phenomenon (ok you mention this at the end of chapter 7) The psychedelic fact that if you play a soft note just before a loud note, that you will not perceive the soft note! I heard that from George anyway, have you heard about it?

Chapter 6, Digital Audio Basics

There are many advantages to the digital form versus the analog form. For one, material things deteriorate over time. Scratches, dirt, and entropy eventually conquer physical records. Secondly,... Here you actually list a disadvantage of analog over digital - not an advantage of digital over analog. Kinda nitpicking here but yeah...

We sample from a complete set because it is expensive, unnecessary, or even impossible to collect information about the whole set. Is that supposed to be incomplete set? You say in summary twice on pg 147, not sure if you meant to do that.

Chapter 7, The DFT

Not really any comments here. Good job!

Chapter 8, Other FTs

Im a big advocate of using Hann instead of Hanning to describe the window function developed by von Hann, since thats his actual last name, but more importantly than that, in conversation its easy to mishear Hanning as Hamming. Typos 1.4, pg 7: IIt is nice to be able to... 2.1, pg 13: ound produced by white noise machines, e.g., is random,... 2.3, pg 20: because there is no clear repetition.Furthermore, there are no distinct... (no space after period) 2.4, pg 26: Frequencies separates by octaves sound so similar... 2.5, pg 27: three more features of wavesuseful to understand... 2.5, pg 31: Sound waves can become more excited in stier mediums due to improvedelasticity [7]. 2.5, pg 44: due to the expansion of their bores from heat.A ute, for example... (no space after period) 2.5, pg 45: As mentioned in the discussion of refraction, a sounds propagation speed (some kind of formatting error?) 3.2, pg 52: we do not perceive as pitched sound because they are so complex.On the contrary,... (no space after period) 3.3, pg 53: TThe Greeks believed so strongly... 4.1, pg 67: Around the time of the pianos invention in the 18th century, 4.2, pg 77: the violins catgut strings. 4.3, pg 80: consequently, its overtone series.The length can be altered (no space after period) 4.3, pg 81: fundamental0 is exactly equal to (no space)

4.3, pg 86: taken inside the mouthpiece and the bore.Because the bell (no space after period) 4.4, pg 89: For this reason, we consider percussive sounds to be more complex than other instruments, but describing their vibrations isnt necessarily complicated. 5.0, pg 109: IIt is essential that air pressure... 5.1 pg 110: a circuit or a car in trac.Impedance matching refers to (no space after period) 5.2 pg 127: The debate might continue forever, if not for the reason that sensitivities and quality preferences dier between ears and musical tastes, then for the reason that music is not only about consonance and dissonance. (pretty sure that then should be than here) 5.2 pg 128: of the 100 Hz fundamental are highlighted by italics.. Since they 6.2 pg 151: in about N log2 N operations.This is a great (no space after period) 7.1 pg 166: (within reasonwe avoid pathological functions that are unmisic-like) unmusic-like? 7.1 pg 167: known as the Taylor and Maclauren series... Maclaurin* 7.6 pg 211: The Fourier transform of a real signal possesses Hermetian symmetry about its... Hermitian* Teachers Comments When you have the opportunity to use an arbitrary number, use humorous numbers such as 420 or 69 (but not 42 because hitchikers guide nerds are lame). You allude to MIR once or twice at the beginning, but nothing comes up again after that. Maybe thatll be your next book. Youre in the engineers world now, and yet you persist to use i instead of j. See me after class. Awesome book! Really inspires me to write one.