Harmonic amplitudes shape timbre and loudness but not pitch.

Evidence

This section has primarily focused on the representation of the fundamental frequency, as that is a primary determinant of the pitch of complex tones (Helmholtz, 1863). However, as we observed in Figure 6–1, each harmonic can have a different amplitude. Although the amplitudes of those harmonics have little to do with the pitch of the sound, they contribute to different attributes of the stimulus, primarily its loudness and timbre (the quality). The characteristics of the sound source (e.g., voice source at the glottis) and the filtering of that source (e.g., resonant cavities of the vocal tract) determine the amplitudes of the harmonics. — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1195

Categorization

• XREF: Directly the source-filter theory of speech production (Fant, source at glottis; filter at vocal tract) central to phonetics. — connects to: The clarinet lacks even harmonics at low tones but approaches odd-even parity higher up — David Howard, Jamie Angus, coustics and Psychoacoustics, 1259; The kettledrum outputs a missing-harmonic series yet still conveys a clear pitch — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 1306
• DEFINE: Clarifies the pitch-vs-timbre division that hearing-impaired perception and hearing aid tuning hinge on.