The same musical interval’s dissonance changes with pitch register

Evidence

The dissonance of the chord in each case is related to the entries in the final column, which indicate increased dissonance in the order C, c, d and D; it can be seen that the dissonance increases as the harmonic number increases and the musical interval decreases. — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 998 (#qualifies, via linked claim)

The idea that relative pitch perception depends solely on detecting a pattern of invariant pitch intervals is not supported by our results. Although the invariant property of the patterns in each trial is the sequence of pitch intervals defining the standard, listeners often could not use this information in the current experiment. Our results are compatible with the notion that in constructing object representations, the tolerance of the representation is a function of the variance in the pattern, i.e. increasing variance in object components, leads to more permissive representations. — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 5327 (#contradicts, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Dissonance depends on proportional separation falling inside the critical bandwidth, not absolute frequency difference; Dissonance depends on musical interval, not a fixed beat rate across frequencies; Instrument timbre determines how dissonant the same two-note interval sounds (+6 more)

Related

• Chord dissonance rises as harmonic number increases and interval shrinks (similarity 0.91)
• Dissonance depends on musical interval, not a fixed beat rate across frequencies (similarity 0.89)
• Interval dissonance increases with position higher in the harmonic series (similarity 0.88)
• Musical intervals between adjacent harmonics shrink as harmonic number rises (similarity 0.86)
• Western music’s privileged intervals show no perceptual detection advantage (similarity 0.85)
• Dissonance arises from inconsistent stretch of notes versus partials (similarity 0.85)
• Exact repetition allows direct pitch comparison whereas transposition forces interval processing (similarity 0.85)
• Perceived pitch intervals match log-frequency ratios regardless of register (similarity 0.84)
• Instrument timbre determines how dissonant the same two-note interval sounds (similarity 0.84)
• Relative pitch perception resists explanation by invariant interval ratios (similarity 0.83)
• The cochlea’s logarithmic place analysis explains why musical intervals sound the same across registers. (similarity 0.83)
• Equal tempered intervals stay consonant because mistuning falls within critical bandwidth (similarity 0.83)
• Chord consonance is maximized when singers’ fundamentals are integer-related harmonics (similarity 0.83)
• Untrained listeners judge two-tone consonance continuously without musical interval prominence (similarity 0.83)
• Simple integer frequency ratios minimize partial interference and thus dissonance (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• The cochlea’s logarithmic place analysis explains why musical intervals sound the same across registers. #complicates (0.75)
• Chord dissonance rises as harmonic number increases and interval shrinks #qualifies (0.72) — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 998
• Relative pitch perception resists explanation by invariant interval ratios #contradicts (0.70) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 5327