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3.4.4Timbre and Emotion Expression
To maximize emotional punch, you can use different properties of tone to reinforce the same emotion. For example, low pitch and wide variations in loudness evoke fear (e.g., the Jaws shark theme).
You can also easily counteract certain emotional expressions of tone properties by emphasizing other tone properties. For example, violin timbre (tone color) by itself usually expresses negative emotions (such as sadness or melancholy), which you can easily counteract with high-register playing and loudness level (e.g., Irish jigs and reels).
You’ll see as you go along that you can use many other musical variables to counteract or to reinforce various emotional effects to your liking.
TABLE 7 Emotional Effects of Timbre (Tone Color)
Timbre Characteristics |
Associated Emotions |
|---|---|
| Simple tone color, few overtones (e.g., flute) | Pleasantness, peace, boredom |
| Complex tone color, many overtones (e.g., over-driven electric guitar) | Power, anger, fear |
| Bright tone color, crisp, fast
tone attack and decay in
performance |
Generally positive emotional valence, happiness |
| Dull tone color, slow attack and decay in performance | Generally negative emotional valence, sadness, tenderness |
| Violin sounds | Sadness, fear, anger |
| Drum sounds | Anger |
| Sharp, abrupt tone attacks | Anger |
Next time you see a movie, focus on the background music from time to time, and see if you can relate the music to what you remember of the information in Tables 5, 6, and 7 above. Professional composers of film scores tend to have a good grasp of the connections between emotional valences and elements of tone such as pitch and loudness. (Chapter 9 has more information on emotion and film music.)