The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory
I helped do a lot of costumer relations for a music instrument maker who makes fixed-tuning instruments (which cannot be retuned by players, it's a fine art).By nature of the instrument, we had a lot of relatively mystical-minded customers, and a solid subset inquired about the availability of instruments tuned to a 432 Hz reference.What was interesting is that there is indeed a difference in 'feel' (character, vibe...) for most acoustic instruments when you tune them down e.g. to an alternative, lower, pitch reference. (Because most aspects of the system are either non-linear e.g. our sensitivity to various pitches, and maybe some sort of psychoacoustic quasi-significance assignment... ... or because simply they are changing one term in a function, e.g. given a fixed thickness of vibrating membrane, tuning it to a different pitch yields a different relationship to the many 'modes' in the system akin to standing waves... etc etc etc)There's nothing mystical about it all of course... but the vibe changes, and many people prefer a slightly lower pitch, and now it is 'carried' by the instruments.Then you get fuzzy thinking... I like this better, it feels better, QED an alternative pitch reference is the key to life itself.What's funny in my experience is that our specific instrument did not have a fixed equal tempered tuning anyway, for technical reasons... so even with a 432 Hz A reference, the pitch values for say C# or F# were not === what they 'should' be according to 432 Hz adherents.But try explaining that gently to an adherent... especially in the context of kindly debunking their mysticism around this topic... 