Conductors’ tempo choices shed light over Beethoven’s metronome
Fig 5
Most common tempo harmonics for each kind of meter.
The tempo extraction algorithm relies on periodic patterns and rhythmic self-similarities. This explains why many of its estimated tempi are actually multiples or submultiples of the real tempo of the sample. In this work, we have called these kinds of mistaken tempi “harmonics” due to the similarity with the homonym physical phenomenon. Their most common values depend on the metric structure of the music and are displayed here. More rarely, we also detected: (i) harmonics 2 y 3/4 in compound meters; (ii) harmonics 2 y 3/4 in simple meters due to the occasional use of triplets; (iii) harmonic 2/3, in simple triple meters.