What exactly is good tone?

[jemtheflute]

what does that have to do with me inferring that you are the hair ball?

Did ya?

Fail.

Oh, and you "infurred", did you?
Well, my dense furball brain defurs to your greater animal wisdom......

[Denny]

*sigh* didn't mean ta be too subtle...


tough crowd again today, innit

[Clarinetcat]

tough crowd again today, innit

Fur sure.

[talasiga]

..........
However, after listening through my entire collection twice now while focusing primarily on tone and not general playing ability...boy, tone is all over the place. There are players whose tones I really like, some I don't like, but one thing they are not is consistent in their tone. Pure, fuzzy, reedy, clear...its all over the place.

So I ask, is there really such a thing as good tone? Or, are we simply hearing the gestalt of a player and mixing tone in with general playing ability when we judge most player's tone?

.....

I think the question goes towards timbre.
I think its more a gestalt of harmonics that inform timbre and there are an infinite variety of ways of obtaining good timbre and a lot of variety in resultant timbre.

Of course, whether you like someone's sound, even though it may be good timbre, is a personal thing but definitely a sound POOR in timbre is not subjective as when you hear a keyboard simulated "flute"

In good tone, the harmonic overtones predominate in the timbre, whereas in bad tone the dissonant ones either predominate or are too pronounced (including unwanted "noise") or the thing is mostly lacking in overtones. There is also "dirty" good timbre where different varieties of dissonant overtones and "noise" significantly colour the overall harmonic predominance in the timbre a bit like a good home brewed or old world beer has its peculiarities which enrich its is already acceptable beer status.

[Nanohedron]

...as you bleerily come down barefoot to answer the postman's knock with something too big for the letterbox... (oh, Merkin's don't generally do things that way, do they???)

For all intents and purposes it's no different on this side of the pond, except...we do it blearily. And in a Merkin accent, of course.

[jemtheflute]

Well, I was bleary myself (no, not beery)..... and had that 1950/60s kids TV /cartoon sterotype image of the US in mind where all post is delivered to a little box-on-a-post on the edge of a huge lawn in suburbia or to a rank of boxes in a lobby in urban apartment contexts - not through an actual front-door letterbox onto the mat....... though of course, my bleary logic was off, 'cos even in Merkin-land items that need signing for or which won't fit through the letterbox aperture must need hand-to-hand delivery....

[Nanohedron]

Well, I was bleary myself (no, not beery)..... and had that 1950/60s kids TV /cartoon sterotype image of the US in mind where all post is delivered to a little box-on-a-post on the edge of a huge lawn in suburbia or to a rank of boxes in a lobby in urban apartment contexts - not through an actual front-door letterbox onto the mat....... though of course, my bleary logic was off, 'cos even in Merkin-land items that need signing for or which won't fit through the letterbox aperture must need hand-to-hand delivery....

Your image is not incorrect. BTW, I think it's fun to sign for stuff in yer underwear.

[MTGuru]

BTW, I think it's fun to sign for stuff in yer underwear.

Whose underwear? Jem's underwear? C'mon, Nano, that's just weird.

[Denny]

[Nanohedron]

BTW, I think it's fun to sign for stuff in yer underwear.

Whose underwear? Jem's underwear? C'mon, Nano, that's just weird.

Uh...yeah. It only just occurred to me that Jem probably didn't know about that.

[jemtheflute]

Your image is not incorrect.

For the benefit of you-all Merkins, I should perhaps explain that in GB (still, for now.....!!!) and, so far as I have seen, Europe in general (where a full domestic delivery system exists at all [e.g. not Spain]), the vast majority of postal deliveries are made actually into every building through the front door - even in remote rural contexts to farms with half-mile drives off minor country lanes etc. As in, not to a box at the gate/on the property perimeter, whence the householder must fetch it. However, arrangements in apartment blocks are probably similar worldwide.

BTW, I think it's fun to sign for stuff in yer underwear.

Whose underwear? Jem's underwear? C'mon, Nano, that's just weird.

No chance! I'd almost certainly never answer the door to the postman in my underwear - unless I was caught half way through actually getting dressed (and then I'd wrap in a towel or whip a dressing-gown on....). If the doorbell went when I was asleep, no need to imagine underwear (In bed? Ugh "That's just weird"! ) - and I'd have to cover up anyway. And I don't ever sit around in my undies either! When I get up I ablute and dress forthwith before anything else, even coffee!

[jemtheflute]

BTW, I think it's fun to sign for stuff in yer underwear.

Whose underwear? Jem's underwear? C'mon, Nano, that's just weird.

Uh...yeah. It only just occurred to me that Jem probably didn't know about that.

So that's where they went off the line last week .... and there I was blaming the magpies, after the twinkly stuff....

Nano the transatlantic knicker-nicker. He has a vested interest, you know..... but why did he singlet me out? He's obviously rather smalls-minded.

(On your own heads be it! I didn't start this.... this time)

[Nanohedron]

And I don't ever sit around in my undies either! When I get up I ablute and dress forthwith before anything else, even coffee!

In contrast, I confess I find a certain lazy charm in being en déshabillé. Makes me feel glamorously dissipated, like Tallulah Bankhead. Except for the part about me being a guy, of course. So the charm is probably totally not there.

[benhall.1]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like sitting out on the patio with me early morning kippers. In me, now slightly saggy, old, string vest and grey Y-Fronts. (Well, they're grey now ...)

[jemtheflute]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like sitting out on the patio with me early morning kippers. In me, now slightly saggy, old, string vest and grey Y-Fronts. (Well, they're grey now ...)

There's a fishy smell to this post. Ah, I know, it's raw, rank untruth.....