Unison, Octave, Destiny’s Child.
In music, I sometimes say two things are the “same.”
For example: "same note."
Or: "same tempo."
But by using the word "same" I don't necessarily mean they are identical. I'm probably just indicating that they share a high degree of Sameness.
How do I measure Sameness? This being rational music theory, I think, speak, and dream in rational numbers. On every level, they are the most fundamental tool for making sense of music.
That's why, before I get to Say My Name, a speed-refresh of rational numbers in just 150 words ➡️ 1
That's the math! Here's the Destiny's Child:
1:1 - The most Sameness
1 is the center of this particular universe. To to use it as a measure of Sameness, it's helpful to think of it in its ratio form: 1:1 2
When Beyonce and Kelly sing "say my name, say my name," in the chorus of Say My Name, they are simply vibrating their vocal chords at the same speed. The frequency of the vibrations coming from Kelly are at a one to one (1:1) ratio to Bey.
Call 1:1 a "unison."
Are their voices distinctive? Yes. Can I tell them apart when they sing together? Sort of! In an interval of 1:1 I do hear that there is more than one voice, but I can't necessarily identify which is which.
A unison has so much Sameness that I only hear one "note" at a time (I'll say their names: "G-G-G-F-F-E Flat"). But tiny variations in performance and vocal quality betray that there's a 1:1 duo happening: the sound is richer than either of them alone. It's thicker. It has movement (especially when Kelly does that delicious vibrato right at the end of "name").
Singing pitches at a 1:1 ratio: seems like a simple enough musical skill. That's because we take it for granted. Personally, I think it's a miracle.
A miraculous skill
Kelly is vibrating her vocal chords 392 times per second when she sings the word "say." This makes the air, and my eardrum, vibrate at that same rate.
Miracle #1: Kelly can maintain 392 Hz quite consistently, despite the fact that humans can't conceptualize something vibrating that fast: she doesn't hear the individual vibrations. Neither do I. Rather, as human beings (Kelly is just like me!) we experience the sensation of tone.
Bey also experiences that sensation of 392 Hz. Let's call that frequency the center3 of our little universe: the pitch "1/1."
Miracle #2: Bey can make her vocal chords match that exact same speed, without her conscious mind being able to count the vibrations individually.
Kelly sings 392 Hz, and Bey can "think it" — and then produce it. They are now both singing the pitch 1/1, creating a nice rich unison: the interval 1:1.
If Bey were to miss the mark slightly (unlikely), she could easily adjust her speed to match Kelly's. The human sensation of tone makes the moment she creates the interval 1:1 obvious: there is a sudden clarity, and the buzzy movement in the tone comes to rest. It glows with Sameness.
…without being taught how
Now if you asked me, in isolation, to make the air vibrate 392 times per second — I wouldn't know where to start. But if Kelly were to sing (or pluck or bow or strike) a pitch of that frequency, I could match it no problem using my perception of tone. I went to music school, but that's not where I learned to do this. I can just do this, because humans can just do this… without ever being taught how.4
Is this math? Yes. Technically, there is math happening in a unison. It's just really simple math: the pitch that is in unison with 392 Hz is… also 392 Hz.
So you could say my brain is doing that math when I "think" that pitch. It multiplies 392 Hz by 1/1 to get 392 Hz.
But this innate human ability to sense and imitate extremely fast vibrations of the air obviously doesn’t end with the simple math of unisons. As the ratios get more complex, this miraculous skill starts to get magical and even kind of weird. It extends to the relationships between pitches with less Sameness: especially those vibrating at speeds that are in rational relationships to each other.
Sidebar: the reference point
This is where it's comforting for me to check back in with a real human reference point. The absolute best one, which I've discussed in a previous article, is the heart rate.🫀 Our experience with it gives meaning to tempos — especially those within it's range.5
More useful right now (and only a tiny bit less universal) is the pitch of the human voice🗣️, and our sensation of tone👂, which we use to perceive it. While it's possible to be alive without the ability to vocalize or hear tones, the sense has undeniably evolved as a general human reference point.
It's also a different point of view than the heart rate: where the heart rate is a "1st person" sensation (it only gives us information about ourselves), the human voice is "2nd person.” It is communicative, and helps us identify each other.
Again, the meanings aren't universal, only the sensations. You won't hear me claiming that everyone gets sad because F#. We build our own library of meanings throughout a lifetime of experience and cultural context, and then apply them to the sensations. Musically or culturally, different tones of voice have unique emotional, cultural, or physiological associations to each person.
1:2 - Same name, slightly less Sameness
It's now the pre-chorus, and LaTavia has entered the chat:
"I know you're sayin' that I'm assuming things"
A 17-year-old contralto non-smoker with 3 octaves of chest voice. LaTavia's vocal chords can go slower.
When Kelly sings “I know you’re sayin’ that…” (on our familiar 392 Hz), LaTavia's brain not only senses it's tone, but can instantaneously and subconsciously do the math (1/2 * 392 Hz), and then accurately produce the result: 196 Hz, the pitch 1/2.
Call 1:2 an "octave."
An octave has a lower degree of Sameness than a unison. And yet!… it still has enough Sameness that we give its two pitches the same name:
392 Hz? 196 Hz? They're both "G" to me. (So are a whole bunch of other pitches)6
Note that LaTavia doesn't need to think "vibrate half as fast" (or even "sing half as high"). Again, she doesn't know how fast her vocal chords are vibrating, and isn't consciously aware of the math.7
This is a completely intuitive skill. All she has to do is think:
“Same pitch… only lower.”
Who decided that Kelly's pitch is the center of the universe?
Maybe LaTavia is sick of Mathew Knowles favoring Kelly and Bey all the time, and that her and LeToya need a new manager, and that she's sick of being "1/2" of everything, and gonna start thinking of her place in the universe as "1/1."
In order to keep the music the same with this different reference point, Kelly need only hear the tone of LaTavia's 1/1 and "vibrate twice as fast" (or "sing twice as high").
All she has to do is think:
“Same pitch, only higher.”
Sidebar (Tea and Goss) — "Same person, only different."
YES, THERE IS AN ELEPHANT IN THIS ROOM. LaTavia and LeToya disappeared from Destiny's Child after this song was recorded.
The video for Say My Name came out: they weren't in it. They had been swapped for Michelle and Farrah. No one even told them. Or told ME… were the three of us really supposed to just find out from TRL??? I bet Bey's dad was behind this. Rude.
And so the last Destiny's Child video LeToya and LaTavia ever appeared in was for the single Bugaboo, released earlier that year.
Do you know we actually have that in common?
Bugaboo was also the last Destiny's Child video that Chris P. Thompson ever appeared in:
You know… I gotta say that I was expecting Bey to be like, really difficult to work with and need a lot of attention but she was pretty cool on set we just hung out and laughed and she totally likes those little cheezy crackers at craft services just like me and omg do you know who was just like so down to earth is Kelly, we still keep in touch. We're all like basically best friends.
So whenever I revisit the video for Say My Name, I know I'm singing along with my OG lineup, but I'm dancing with the new one… and it has a Sameness ratio of 1:2 to the original! But the name is still "Destiny's Child"… (as I've been saying, 1:2 is enough Sameness to use the same name).
The intro, and your dance to it
We're dancing now. But first: there's some ambiguity in the intro of Say My Name. Who is that voice right at the beginning? It sounds like he says "da cha na na."
Turns out, that's the voice of Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins, and what he said was misinterpreted for years as "Darkchild Na Nahh." Well, he's since clarified: he actually said "Darkchild '99" — a sweet little audio watermark naming the year of the production and immediately identifying him as the producer of the track… just in case ASCAP forgot what name to put on the check.
Do you know what else is ambiguous in this intro?
THE TEMPO.
Listen again and do your personal Tiktok dance. Which version is it — do you jerk into poses and freeze? Do you lay back and slowly nod your head? Or do you go straight into that fast party-bounce?
Darkchild is so genius: he's playing with three different tempos, but they share an exceptional Sameness. This allows him to create three completely different energy levels throughout the track, all of which sound like the same tempo.
…and that tempo also lends itself to three different dance styles, as our new Destiny's Child lineup will show you in the video.
1/1 - The Chorus
The central tempo of Say My Name is in the chorus. It's 70bpm:8 I'd recognize that as a nice calm groove — at the low end of the resting heart rate. I'm probably sitting down… maybe I'm on the phone? Feels smooth to me: my little head nods connect the beats.
1/2 - The Verse
"Same tempo, only slower"
The verses have a signature Destiny's Child move… the "whip n freeze," (they don't call it that, I do) and Darkchild has given them the perfect vehicle for it: a super slow tempo with tons of space between its huge beats — almost 2 seconds each!
This is from the first verse, and you can see how he plays with occasionally foreshadowing the chorus tempo. Just tiny little tastes: saving it for later.
2/1 - The Pre-chorus
"Same tempo, only faster"
So yeah, the pre-chorus is the best part of this track, that's just a fact. A Certified Bop. It's where everybody starts bouncing and doing that waving thing with one hand. It's so awesome. And it’s the greatest ever use case for flexatones. Also sleighbells.
And what's super good about a 2/1 pre-chorus after a 1/2 verse: not only are you suddenly and shockingly dancing 4 times as fast, but it also leads majestically back into the central tempo. As the pre-chorus ends there is actually the sensation of leaning back and the heart rate calming down: a nice visceral sense of resolution going into the chorus (1/1) at last.
Briefly addressing the concerns of the musically over-educated
… "but how do you [feel it] / [conduct it] / [notate it]?"
As it turns out, 2:1 tempo relationships have just as much Sameness as 2:1 pitch relationships. Tempos just exist at much slower speeds (again: the scale of the human heart rate, rather than the very fast vibrations of the human voice and eardrums).
This is evidenced by the never-ending argument in my own band about how certain passages should be felt, or conducted: the more Sameness in the ratio between two potential interpretations, the more ambiguity, and the bloodier the argument gets.
And it doesn't just affect how you nod your head or wave your arms — it affects how the music looks on the page. The same music, notated at the 2/1 tempo, is only different in that it uses way less printer ink and probably looks easier to play. Whether you re-notate "2" into "4" or "3" into "6," the ratio between the tempos is 2:1, meaning they have a high level of Sameness and thus can potentially feel like the same tempo.
The Video
That seems a good place to stop for today and thank you for taking this journey with me.
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Credit due:
Special thanks to Sam Z Solomon, who's lifetime of deep thinking about how to explain music has made him an incredible teacher, a stimulating hang, and a contributor to this article!
Sam teaches all matter of tempo and rhythmic concerns using popular music as a reference. He is the one who pointed out to me the fact that "Say My Name" manifests three levels of tempo (and that Destiny's Child manifest it in their choreography!!)
I was gonna do it in 200 words, but that just seemed like… 4/3rds too many.
A rational is a number.
Whenever I see a rational, my brain always instinctively tries to apply meaning to it. I think "x in the space of y," or "5 divided by 7" or "cut time." But it's simpler than that: it's just a certain type of number:
It can be expressed as a ratio, aka the quotient of two integers:
2/1, 28/7. A million/basquillion. Etc.
It can also be expressed as a decimal:
Convert it by dividing the numerator by the denominator (3/2 = 1.5)
If the digits either a) terminate after a certain point (.25 🙅🏻♂️), or b) settle into a pattern that repeats forever (.333…👉), then you've got a rational number.
If they go on forever with no repeats (hello, π!)… Irrational. Real! But not rational.
Why the colon?
- When I use a slash, I'm talking about a number, or a single pitch or tempo.
- When I use a colon, I'm talking about the interval between two numbers.
For example, sing the pitches 1/1 and 2/1 together, and 2:1 is the interval between them.
It becomes clearer whey this is useful when neither number is 1/1:
Put the numbers 4/3 and 3/2 together, and 9:8 is the interval between them.
David B. Doty's Just Intonation Primer is a book I'll be going into in depth and referencing constantly. This distinction between use of a slash and colon is one of many practical distinctions it invented that I wish the rest of the music theory world shared.
I introduced the idea of the "fundamental" as the starting point of a harmonic series in this previous article.
Even if you think you're "tone deaf" — given a frequency in the right range in the right context, you can do it. Promise. You can also hear the difference between one voice and two in unison.
I previously went deep into this idea… to recap: every living human on earth experiences the heart rate: it's absolutely universal.
Its full range happens to match up almost perfectly with the range of rates we experience as tempo.
For example, we've all felt a heart rate of 126 bpm at one point or another — and the context of our individual experience with that rate helps give our own personal meaning to music that might use it.
There are 7 of these "G"s on the piano keyboard alone. If I really want to specify which one I'm talking about, I'll just add a number between 1 and 7. for example: G7 (3,136 Hz).
I can then just multiply each successive pitch by 1/2 to get the next one below, all the way down to G1 (49 Hz).
Our brains can calculate really complex rational relationships between pitches without us even realizing it’s happening. In fact, it can do math that our conscious mind would be too lazy to try without a calculator. Whats 4/3 * 121 Hz? Meh, who knows… but I bet if I sang “here” you could sing “…comes the bride.”
I'm lying. It's actually 69 BPM. The math looks cleaner this way.
Brilliant brilliant Chris you always inspire and challenge me.