The Chord of Nature (harmonic series)

Musical quality or pitch seems to be something entirely 'sense received', with properties that are objective, and quite independent of the auditor. The truth is that a large part of what is heard as 'properties' of the sound, is determined by subjective, psychological, and even individual physiological factors. Much of what we conceive as belonging to the audible source 'out there', are in truth perceptions arising from what is inherently within our own way of hearing, or within our perceiving mechanisms.

Conversely,  there are some genuinely 'objective' properties of sound, on which how we perceive the sound greatly depends, even though our perception may not be fine enough for us to be consciously aware of these properties existing within the sound itself.

One of the most remarkable of these properties is the so-called Chord of Nature, inherent in most musical tones, and in many other sound sources.

The Chord of Nature  is recognised unconsciously by the ear-brain system. One could even say our natural, unconscious perception 'expects' to 'hear' the Chord of Nature in tones. But it is also possible to consciously hear and recognise the Chord of Nature, at will. 

Text books usually begin by describing the Chord of Nature in terms of 'overtones', 'harmonics', and so forth. So that we can begin to sense the greater context, we will approach it in a different way . . .

next