Mel scale

Hi there,

has anyone heard of the Mel scale?

http://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio/handbook/Mel.html

Used in speech analysis, and it's defined in terms of
intervals that naive listeners hear to be equal in size.

I'm a bit intrigued by this, and would be interested to know more
about it - especially since it is non linear in the log of the
frequency in hertz.

Robert

--- In tuning@y..., "Robert Walker" <robertwalker@n...> wrote:
> Hi there,
>
> has anyone heard of the Mel scale?
>
> http://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio/handbook/Mel.html
>
> Used in speech analysis, and it's defined in terms of
> intervals that naive listeners hear to be equal in size.
>
> I'm a bit intrigued by this, and would be interested to know more
> about it - especially since it is non linear in the log of the
> frequency in hertz.
>
> Robert

the mel scale tells you what intervals sound the same for *sine
waves*. the non-linearity explains why, in the low and high
registers, a ratio considerably greater than 2 is needed to produce a
subjective octave for *sine waves*.

however, once you're dealing with real musical timbres, especially
those with harmonic partials, the mel scale ceases to be of any
utility, and plain old cents or semitones or octaves are a much
better measure of subjective pitch differences.

hi Robert,

> From: "Robert Walker" <robertwalker@ntlworld.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Thursday, October 24, 2002 6:20 AM
> Subject: [tuning] Mel scale
>
>
> Hi there,
>
> has anyone heard of the Mel scale?
>
> http://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio/handbook/Mel.html
>
> Used in speech analysis, and it's defined in terms of
> intervals that naive listeners hear to be equal in size.
>
> I'm a bit intrigued by this, and would be interested to know more
> about it - especially since it is non linear in the log of the
> frequency in hertz.

there was a small flurry of activity concerning the mel scale
back in the mid-1960s. i have two references:

Pedersen, Paul. 1965. "The Mel Scale".
_Journal of Music Theory_, vol 9 # 2 [Winter], p 295-308.

Pikler, Andrew G. 1966. "Mels and Musical Intervals".
_Journal of Music Theory_, vol 10 # 2 [Winter], p 288-298.

hmmm ... i really ought to write a definition of "mel"
for the Tuning Dictionary.

-monz
"all roads lead to n^0"