Mathematics and

Music
Based on the paper : Mathematics of Music, Janelle K. Hammond (2011)
A Mathematical Analysis of Sounds
Purpose of the talk :
To describe the form of musical tone in the point of view of
mathematics
Sound Basics
- Music composed of individual sound

- Sound can be represented as a sinusoidal wave in which the properties of the
sound can be determined such as the pitch of the sound can be determined from
its frequency and the strength of the sound can be determined from its amplitude

- Common sinusoidal wave function

=

Substitute for = 2f

= 2f

for A = Amplitude
f = Frequency


Pure Tone
- Pure Tone is a sound that constituted only by a fundamental tone

Frequency Table of tones determined from experiment

Tone A A# B C C# D D# E F F# G G# A
Frequenc
y
440 466 494 523 554 587 622 659 698 740 784 831 880
Example of Pure Tone
The graph of pure tone of
low A with frequency 220 Hz

the function of this pure tone
is
= sin (2. 220. )
The graph of pure tone of low E with frequency 330 Hz

the function of this pure tone is

= sin (2. 330. )
These pure tones can be easily synthesized in laboratory but the sound produced
from pure tone tastes almost empty and stale because it lacks of timbre or tonal color.

Sounds Produced by Musical Instrument
- When we play a note in musical instrument, actually it produces the fundamental,
overtones and harmonics which contribute to the produced timbre, then we conceive
these sounds as a single tone

- Timbre is determined by the amplitude and harmonics produced by the instrument

In the graphs below, we see the graph of the sound produced by 3 different musical
instruments when all of them play the low F (frequency 349 Hz). The blue wave is the
sound wave and the red bars are the amplitudes of respective harmonics.
Graph of low F produced by simple synthesizer in laboratory
Graph of low F produced by clarinet
Graph of low F produced by oboe
Fourier Series
Fourier Series was founded by French mathematician Joseph Fourier when he was
trying to solve a problem about heat conduction and then later this series also used
by Daniel Bernoulli and Leonard Euler to analyze vibrating strings and astronomy.

This series is used to express a function as an infinite series of sine and cosine
function

For function with period of 2L then the Fourier Series representation will be

=
0
+

cos

sin

=1


With

0
=
1
2

=
1

=
1

Application in Music
The main idea is to use Fourier Series to breakdown the complex sounds that
produced by musical instrument to individual sounds, this method is very useful since
it can represent the individual sound in trigonometric function which make it easier to
analyze the amplitude and frequency of each individual sound.
We will use the Fourier series in form

1
2

0
+

cos

sin

=1


With

0
=
1

=
1

=
1

For an example, lets see at the graph which made by a violin playing in low D (frequency 294 Hz)
It is easier to analyze the data when the graph is represented in form of Fourier Series

1
2

0
+

cos

sin

=1


1
2

0
+
1
cos

+
1
sin

+
2
cos
2

+
2
sin
2

+ . . .
The non constant terms in the series represent the individual pure tone that build up
the overall tone and determine its timbre. From here we can also conclude that the
frequency of

harmonic is 1 +
0
for
0
is the frequency of the fundamental tone
First term represent the
fundamental tone

1
cos

+
1
sin

Second term represent
the first harmonics

2
cos
2

+
2
sin
2

Conclusion
As we can see, mathematics and music are tightly related. The naturally pleasing ratios
used in music are so pleasing because of the mathematical principals behind them and
all western music is based on this harmonic series. Fourier Analysis is useful in
modeling and breaking up sound so they will be easier to analyze and opens up
practical possibilities to model and define sound using Fourier Analysis.
Thank You Very

Much