The overtone series is the sonic example of the Golden Ratio, and it underlies all music (and all sound, really), no matter where the music comes from. Brass players are intimately familiar with the overtone series (also known as the harmonic series), even if they don’t know what it’s called. Produce sound through any tube (like didgeridoo, shofar, flute, bugle, trumpet, garden hose, etc.) while keeping the length of the tube the same (i.e. don’t push keys or valves), and you’ll hear the overtone series. With practice, you can do it with your voice, too, as demonstrated by singer Anna-Maria Hefele in the video below. After her demonstration, there’s a couple more video of what overtone singing sounds like in a piece of music.
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SUPERSONUS: The European Resonance Ensemble
Anna-Maria Hefele, overtone singing
Eva-Maria Rusche, harpsichord
Anna-Liisa Eller, kannel
Wolf Janscha, jew´s harp
Marco Ambrosini, nyckelharpa, jew´s harp
Overtone singing was first introduced to me in the form of Tuvan throat singing by virtuosos Hu Huun Tur. Here’s some concert footage. It’s over an hour long, but if you don’t have the time to listen, skip down to the second video that starts at an introduction and superb example of the sygyrt style of singing.
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The Practice of Practice 