Soundwaves of the Color Wheel

From Sound Waves vs. Light Waves

Q: i heard this from a friend, color has sound. from what i think i understand ,if matter is condensed vibration and pigments have different weights ,the intensity of vibration in each pigment would cause a certain tone . i need clarification thanks.

A: The key background to this question is the nature of sound waves and light waves. You’re right in that sound waves are a vibration traveling through an object, including "condensed" things like solids and liquids. In solids, those waves can consist of either alternating compressed and stretched regions, or regions wiggling sideways, compared to the direction the wave is travelling. Light is a wave of oscillating electric and magnetic fields perpendicular to the direction it’s going. Light can travel fine through a vacuum, which can have fields in it, but there can’t be sound in a vacuum because there’s no stuff there to oscillate.

Audible sound has frequencies that cover a very big range, from about 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz, meaning that the pressure at your ear oscillates back and forth 20 to 20,000 times per second. Each frequency gives a different audible pitch. Visible light has frequencies from around 4*10^14 Hz to around 8*10^14 Hz. Each frequency gives a slightly different visible color. Not only are the light frequencies much higher, but the highest one is only about twice the lowest one. The sound frequencies are much lower, and the highest one is a thousand times higher than the lowest one. So you can see that there’s no direct match between the sound and light oscillations.

If you are wondering what effect the pigments (light absorbers) in a material have on the type of sounds that come from it, the answer is usually: not much. There’s not much connection between the frequencies of light some pigment absorbs and the frequencies of audible sound it might absorb or emit. The color of a pigment also is really unconnected with the density or rigidity of the molecules, which affect how sound travels. Lots of different common pigments are organic compounds with densities not too far from 1 gram/cm^3, yet these provide a whole array of different colors.

This link leads to an interesting book that deals with metaphysics. It is helpful and friendly to musical people. Readable even for those like me who are not conditioned to reading this idiom. Itzhak Bentov is a genius.

Color Wheel Image came from this site.