11-27-2014, 02:43 AM
This one's going to be hard to prove. You'll need a good ear to hear it, as in being able to distinguish musical notes and their relative tones. I've tried to make it easy for most people by putting this short (12-second) clip together:
OcarinaCicadaCompare.mp3
Claim: In The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time at nighttime in Hyrule Field and some surrounding areas, the cicadas heard amongst the animal sounds and ambient noise will sing the same five notes as Link's ocarina.
The Ocarina plays a quadraphonic scale of: D, F, A, B, and a higher D. The cicada sounds were obtained by recording an entire in-game night's worth of Hyrule Field noises, cutting out each chirp in a wave editor, comparing them all to sort them by pitch, and discovering there were only 5 distinct tones. Even with the comparison clip, it can be hard to identify them as the Ocarina notes, for several reasons: they're short and high-pitched; they're polyphonic (several pitches playing simultaneously, though not all distinctly, to produce a timbre) as opposed to the more sinusoidal sounds of the Ocarina; they have fast volume-warbles; said warbles don't follow the same scale as their respective pitches.
If you want to hear them individually or check out their waves for yourself, just right-click-save-target these links: D, F, A, B, D2. (note: I boosted their volumes for the comparison clip.)
What may be more evident, at least for those with a bit of musical background, are the relative pitches between each of those cicada sounds.
The 1st is the base note (we'll assume it's a D)
The 2nd is 3 semitones higher (which would be an F)
The 3rd is another 4 semitones higher (A)
The 4th is another 2 semitones higher (B)
And the 5th is another 3 semitones higher (D, 12 semitones or 1 octave up!)
Knowing the Zelda series' knack for the jovial and self-referential sort of details and Easter eggs, and the particular focus on musical notes in Ocarina of Time, I'm guessing this is more than just a coincidence.
If people find it hard to tell for sure from the clips, and need more evidence, I could do a closer analysis of the cicada sounds' frequencies.
OcarinaCicadaCompare.mp3
Claim: In The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time at nighttime in Hyrule Field and some surrounding areas, the cicadas heard amongst the animal sounds and ambient noise will sing the same five notes as Link's ocarina.
The Ocarina plays a quadraphonic scale of: D, F, A, B, and a higher D. The cicada sounds were obtained by recording an entire in-game night's worth of Hyrule Field noises, cutting out each chirp in a wave editor, comparing them all to sort them by pitch, and discovering there were only 5 distinct tones. Even with the comparison clip, it can be hard to identify them as the Ocarina notes, for several reasons: they're short and high-pitched; they're polyphonic (several pitches playing simultaneously, though not all distinctly, to produce a timbre) as opposed to the more sinusoidal sounds of the Ocarina; they have fast volume-warbles; said warbles don't follow the same scale as their respective pitches.
If you want to hear them individually or check out their waves for yourself, just right-click-save-target these links: D, F, A, B, D2. (note: I boosted their volumes for the comparison clip.)
What may be more evident, at least for those with a bit of musical background, are the relative pitches between each of those cicada sounds.
The 1st is the base note (we'll assume it's a D)
The 2nd is 3 semitones higher (which would be an F)
The 3rd is another 4 semitones higher (A)
The 4th is another 2 semitones higher (B)
And the 5th is another 3 semitones higher (D, 12 semitones or 1 octave up!)
Knowing the Zelda series' knack for the jovial and self-referential sort of details and Easter eggs, and the particular focus on musical notes in Ocarina of Time, I'm guessing this is more than just a coincidence.
If people find it hard to tell for sure from the clips, and need more evidence, I could do a closer analysis of the cicada sounds' frequencies.
