Sethares Dissonance Curve Calculator

About the Dissonance Curve Calculator

This interactive tool implements William Sethares' sensory dissonance model from his book "Tuning, Timbre, Spectrum, Scale". The calculator uses the Plomp-Levelt consonance curves to measure the sensory dissonance between frequency components (partials) in a sound spectrum. By analyzing how dissonance varies across different musical intervals, you can discover which intervals sound most consonant for any given timbre, including inharmonic and stretched spectra.

Features

• Calculate dissonance curves for custom frequency spectra
• Preset timbres: harmonic, piano-like, bell, and stretched
• Automatic detection of consonant intervals (local minima)
• Interactive visualization with hover tooltips
• Toggle between frequency ratios and cents
• Real-time spectrum analysis

Applications

Use this tool for psychoacoustic research, alternative tuning systems, spectral music composition, timbre-based scale design, and understanding the relationship between spectrum and scale. Perfect for composers, music theorists, sound designers, and researchers in music cognition and psychoacoustics.