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Math Prof Uncovers Secret Chord
chebucto writes "The opening chord to A Hard Day's Night is famous because for 40 years, no one quite knew exactly what chord Harrison was playing. Musicians, scholars and amateur guitar players alike had all come up with their own theories, but it took a Dalhousie mathematician to figure out the exact formula. Dr. Brown used Fourier transforms to find the notes in the chord, and deduced that another George — George Martin, the Beatles producer — also played on the chord, adding a piano chord that included an F note impossible to play with the other notes on the guitar."
That David played, and it pleased the lord,
but you don't really care for music, do you?
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
Decent idle story. Not completely retarded, though still generally meaningless. I can appreciate this kind of stuff, instead of the utter crap idle started out with. I guess it's getting better.
Why didn't anyone just ask Harrison?
the brown note... that should be some interesting math.
"You killed my yogurt!" --Fred Fredburger
Why didn't anyone just ask him?
Well, perfesser, what the frell's the chord?
You save only 59 seconds over 8 miles by going 75 instead of 65. Do you really have to pass that guy? Do the Math!
I don't get it. Why do we get two Beatles-related items in one day, did we miss a Ringo birthday or something? Please, leave the idle stuff off the main page. You know its lame, we know its lame, since it is a complete waste of time, why let it be a complete waste of disk space, cycles and bandwidth?
Stories like this are actually interesting and have a math/science side to them, instead of being mindless humor that everyone has already seen elsewhere. This is something that a math teacher could show her students to make them interested, more so than all the silly posters and videos they used when I was going through grade school.
haha. math pwns the arts at their own game.
The Moody Blues have been in search of that little bastard since 1968. Can someone call them and tell them it was finally found?
Help protect civil rights from abuse by the TSA - visit TSA News Blog.
http://www.tsanewsblog.com
I've always known there was a piano in the song. It's actually kind of hard to miss if you ever played one before.
But then again, I do have hearing that's sharper than most. at age 26 I can still pick up about 25+KHz frequencies.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
The professor was working like a dog on this.
If I'm on time as opposed to a minute late, it is worth it.
There are like a million copies of this article verbatim and with the same picture. Here's his page http://www.mscs.dal.ca/~brown/
and then find these:
http://www.guitarplayer.com/story.asp?sectioncode=8&storycode=15819
http://www.mscs.dal.ca/~brown/AHDNSoloJIB.pdf
that the sheet music could be read.
Cordially,
Kilgore Trout
P.S.: Enable Cyrillic morons.
It's a G7sus4 chord. It's never been a secret. http://guitar.about.com/library/blchord_g7sus46.htm
Then we will know for sure. It is probably the red and blue chord.
Dr. Brown's work on the opening chord of Hard Day's Night is four years old. His paper is at:
http://www.mscs.dal.ca/~brown/n-oct04-harddayjib.pdf
(Note the "oct04" date in the URL).
His recent work is on the same song, but it's not about the opening chord. It's about the guitar solo (which was actually a duet with the piano), which Harrison played an octave down, at half speed, and then sped up. Which he proved by noticing where the piano notes went from double-strings to triple-strings, as seen by tiny mis-tunings between the strings.
It's pretty interesting work:
http://www.mscs.dal.ca/~brown/AHDNSoloJIB.pdf
(Note: slashdot is just reporting the article, which is new. But it comes from Dr. Brown's own school, so I don't know why they're reporting the wrong story, except to guess that the older story was a well-known mystery among guitarists.)
The article doesn't actually say what he thinks the chord was. I do music transcriptions (http://jordanbalagot.com/musictranscriptions.html ) and to me it sounds like G7 sus 4 / D. Or actual pitches: D1 G2 G3 C3 F3 G3. I do hear the F in there...If it's not playable on guitar it's possible the Beatles combined two recordings at once of different takes. They used all sorts of innovative recording techniques like that.
...adding a piano chord that included an F note impossible to play with the other notes on the guitar.
There are no notes that are impossible to play on a guitar. However, you have to tune the guitar to a nonstandard, non eagbde like Led Zepplin did on a few songs (an example is Black Mountain Side on their first album.
I have an incredibly hard time playing a B chord; I have to kind of fake it and not hit all the strings. But then I'm no virtuoso, it took me twenty years to learn Starway To Heaven.
Free Martian Whores!
They did that joke in the first post, dude.
Technoli
I for one welcome our new music math overlords.
Opening chord
"A Hard Day's Night" is immediately identifiable before the vocals even begin, thanks to George Harrison's unmistakable Rickenbacker 360/12 12-string guitar's "mighty opening chord".[12] According to George Martin, "We knew it would open both the film and the soundtrack LP, so we wanted a particularly strong and effective beginning. The strident guitar chord was the perfect launch"[8] having what Ian MacDonald calls "'a significance in Beatles lore matched only by the concluding E major of "A Day in the Life", the two opening and closing the group's middle period of peak creativity'".[13] "That sound you just associate with those early 1960s Beatles records".[14]
Listen to the opening chord (helpinfo)
Analysis of the chord varies, with it being described as G7add9sus4,[13] G7sus4,[15][16] or G11sus4[12] and others below.
The exact chord is an Fadd9 confirmed by Harrison during an online chat on 15 February 2001:[17]
Q: Mr Harrison, what is the opening chord you used for "A Hard Day's Night"?
A: It is F with a G on top, but you'll have to ask Paul about the bass note to get the proper story.
According to Walter Everett, the opening chord has an introductory dominant function because McCartney plays D in the bass; Harrison and Martin play F A C G in twelve-string guitar and piano, over the bass D, giving the chord a mixture-coloured neighbor, F; two diatonic neighbors, A and C; plus an anticipation of the tonic, G -- the major subtonic as played on guitar being a borrowed chord commonly used by the Beatles, first in "P.S. I Love You" (see mode mixture), and later in "Every Little Thing", "Tomorrow Never Knows" and "Got to Get You into My Life" (in the latter two against a tonic pedal).[18]
Film of the Beatles performing "A Hard Day's Night", shows both John and George gripping a Gm11 in 3rd position, not an Fadd9. The Fadd9 is used during the chorus and is the chord form used for the outro fade out.[citation needed]
In contrast, Alan W. Pollack interprets the chord as a surrogate dominant (surrogate V, the dominant preparing or leading to the tonic chord), in G major the dominant being D, with the G being an anticipation that resolves in the G major chord that opens the verse. He also suggests it is a mixture of d minor, F major, and G major (missing the B).[19] Tony Bacon calls it a Dm7sus4 (D F G A C), which is the dominant seventh (plus the fourth, G).[20] (For more information regarding chord functions see diatonic function.)
Everett points out that the chord relates to the Beatles' interest in pandiatonic harmony.[21]
Dominic Pedler has also provided an interpretation of the famous chord, with the Beatles and George Martin playing the following:
George Harrison: Fadd9 in 1st position on Rickenbacker 360/12 12-string electric guitar
John Lennon: Fadd9 in 1st position on a Gibson J-160E 6-string acoustic guitar
Paul McCartney: high D played on the D-string, 12th fret on Hofner 500/1 electric bass
George Martin: D2-G2-D3 played on a Steinway Grand Piano
Ringo Starr: Subtle snare drum and ride cymbal
This gives the notes: G-B-D-F-A-C (the B is a harmonic). One of the interesting things about this chord (as described by Pedler) is how McCartney's high bass note reverberates inside the soundbox of Lennon's acoustic guitar and begins to be picked up on Lennon's microphone or pick-up during the sounding of the chord. This gives the chord its special "wavy" and unstable quality. Pedler describes the effect as a "virtual pull-off".[22]
Jason Brown, Professor for the Faculty of Computer Science at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, whose research interests include graph theory, combinatorics, and combinatorial algorithms, announced in October 2004 that after six months of research he succeeded in analysing the opening chord by "de-composing the sound into original frequencies, using a combination of computer software and old-fashioned chalkboard." According to Brown, the Rickenbacker guitar wasn't the only instrument used. "It wasn't jus
Speaking of craptastic, I
see that the narrow com-
ment field is still in place.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
So let me see if I got this straight: for 40 years Beatles fans have been fighting over what combination of frequencies were used in this chord, but not one of them thought to check what frequencies were being used in the chord until now?
For non-EEs out there, a Fourier transform is a basic algorithm to translate from the time domain to the frequency domain. Any audio program or player or graphic equalizer that displays the frequency spectrum instead of the actual wave coming out the speakers is using this transform. The idea that nobody thought to look at that display for 40 years is a more than a little absurd.
"The exact chord is an Fadd9 confirmed by Harrison during an online chat on 15 February 2001:[17]
Q: Mr Harrison, what is the opening chord you used for "A Hard Day's Night"?
A: It is F with a G on top, but you'll have to ask Paul about the bass note to get the proper story. "
quoted
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Hard_Day%27s_Night_(song)
to a nonstandard, non eagbde
eagbde is pretty darned non-standard. Standard 6-string guitar tuning is ebgdAE high to low.
Did George just play the G7sus4 chord in concerts?
he'd know the mystery chord is most probably "the green button".
I refuse to have a sig... dammit!
Ah grasshopper, one day you will be ready to leave
www.xkcd.com/339
What did he play in concert?
Proud member of the American Non Sequitur Society. We might not make much sense, but boy do we love pizza!
This would have been a great test for Direct Note Access software. http://www.celemony.com/cms/index.php?id=dna
Could it be done better by education? Seems like musical constipation is from not being able to push sheet to the bar. I call it the Guitar Hero Effect: for those that cant recite, simulate in stupidity. It's like hearing non-tuned guitars play a song; it gives fiber for when a real song follows.
Now, the important question, will they name it after him - the Brown note?!
Not sure what the BFD is that Professor Mathematics determined that some of that chord is played on a piano.
Any one with a decent set of ears can hear that...
He found the Brown Note.
Not impossible: 12 string guitar with modified/alternate tuning. Tuned properly it could have been an all-strings open strum.
I've learnt a lot of songs just by watching how the song was played live. Must be an old film of the Beatles playing it somewhere. Just got to watch what George was playing at the time.
I find the premise of this story too difficult to believe. Anyone with a decent ear can hear what is going on; close your eyes and listen to the song, and you will hear beyond a doubt the twelve string and also the piano. There is no mystery there, and careful listening would allow anyone to pick out individual notes in the chord--musicians do this all the time, to the point of memorizing chord sequences by ear and what notes they contain. Also, one second on youtube showed me live footage of Harrison actually playing the opening chord on camera. I call the whole thing BS, though it's cool that the guy actually analyzed the signal mathematically.
'I think I've found a new note in between B and C, I always knew it was there. I'm gonna call it howards note' - Howard Moon from the Mighty Boosh
Joke? No, thanks...
You save only 59 seconds over 8 miles by going 75 instead of 65. Do you really have to pass that guy? Do the Math!
George Harrison had a band?
Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly and applying the wrong fix.
The seventh note in a chord.
Hi all,
I played on this particular guitar in England, a few years ago. It was tuned in C major. So the F is just under your finger in that case, nothing special.
"...an F note impossible to play with the other notes on the guitar."
For every tuning? Every string is independent and can be tuned to any note. Nor does a given string position require that the normally used string be installed there. And just because it's a 12 string doesn't mean the secondary strings have to be tuned to the note, octave, or any given relationship since they're equally independent. All 12 positions can be filled with any string and that string tuned anywhere within the range in which it maintains its harmonics and their combined tension is balanced by the neck tension.
That's all true, correct and academic. The following is an educated guess and attempt, but practical.
Using normal guitar tuning (EADGBE):
Middle finger, second string, third fret.
Index finger, third string, second fret.
Ring finger, fourth string, third fret.
Little finger, fifth string, fourth fret.*
Thumb on first string, third fret.
Roll wrist with knuckles towards tuning keys and put side of index finger across sixth string, first fret.
The last line requires a bit of flexibility, especially to hold. Since it doesn't have to be sustained beyond that one chord, it can be forced. I contend that's exactly what Harrison is doing because the opening chord is slightly sharp, as though being stretched or the tremlo bar pulled, and such forcing will bend the neck back, sharpening the notes.
The central part of the chord (up through *) is fairly well known. Hold the finger positions and slide up 4 frets. Most recognizable uses are Jimi Hendrix's Purple Haze and Foxy Lady.
That was by experience and ear. Had they given the actual notes I could have cheated and used any of several fretting programs that let you put in a series of notes and a tuning and gives back one or more fingerings.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
Immediately! This is exactly the sort of thing the Ig Nobel folks are looking for.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
All the folks saying you can't play a 7-note chord on a 6-string guitar should familiarize themselves with harmonics.
http://www.harmony-central.com/Guitar/harmonics.html
The harmonic series is a mathematical definition, generally used when talking about frequencies. The harmonic series is important in musical applications because most instruments (including guitar) produce sounds that contain harmonic frequencies. The natural frequencies of the string mentioned above form a harmonic series.
A frequency is harmonic if it is an integer multiple of the fundamental frequency. The fundamental is the first harmonic (although it's generally referred to as the fundamental). The second harmonic is two times the frequency of the fundamental, the third harmonics is three times the fundamental, and so on. So with a fundamental of 100 Hz, the second harmonic is 200 Hz, the third is 300 Hz, the fourth is 400 Hz, etc.
Rather than working with numbers, you can think of the harmonic series in terms of musical intervals. The first harmonic is the fundamental. The second harmonic is an octave above. The third harmonic is an octave and a fifth above the fundamental. The fourth harmonic is two octaves above the fundamental. The fifth harmonic is a another major third higher, the sixth is another minor third higher, and the series continues.