Make my mac a pitch pipe/tuning fork

October 8, 2010 3:47 PM

Is there a free program or way to have my macbook act as a pitch pipe/tuning fork, at various frequencies? For example, a sustained A at 441 Hz. And then other notes from the chromatic scale using equal temperament.

Hope I'm making myself clear. I don't need a tuner, just a way to play and sustain a pitch to tune off of. Even better would be a way to play two pitches at the same time, but one would be fine.

It's pretty important I be able to adjust between 440 and 441 and 442 Hz.

If there's some place I can record or download a file, that'd be fine too. But I kind of imagined there would be a dedicated app or something for this.

posted by Busoni to Computers & Internet (8 answers total)

Response by poster: I forgot to say that I prefer this be not an online app, since I'd like to be able to use it without an internet connection.
posted by Busoni at 3:49 PM on October 8, 2010

Would this Tone Generator do the trick?
posted by talkingmuffin at 3:52 PM on October 8, 2010

Best answer: It probably would. But I also managed to find this somehow, moments after posting, when I couldn't find anything like it before. I really need a takebacksies on this one.
posted by Busoni at 3:54 PM on October 8, 2010 [2 favorites]

I use audacity for this exact purpose in my Physics classes.

It's not an online app, but is amazing.
posted by jz at 4:20 PM on October 8, 2010

441? A is 440 hz, isn't it?
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 6:55 PM on October 8, 2010

If you're not afraid of a wee bit of programming (producing a sine wave for A440 is part of the most basic tutorial, in fact), try SuperCollider. Also, Chuck is kinda similar and easier to use.

SuperCollider is definitely overkill, but it's awesome.
posted by dubitable at 8:23 PM on October 8, 2010

Sometimes
posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 8:35 PM on October 8, 2010

("Sometimes" was in response to Chocolate Pickle)
posted by AsYouKnow Bob at 8:36 PM on October 8, 2010