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Yanny/Laurel

  • 1.  Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 09:20
    The twiitersphere and the larger netiverse  have been abuzz this week with a bit of audio trickery. There is a clip which has the words Laurel and Yanny repeating over and over. Some folks hear Laurel and some hear Yanny. The first time I heard it, in the morning before work, I could hear both though the higher pitched word Yanny was dominant. After a few seconds of listening I realized that each word was coming from a different end of the frequency/pitch spectrum. Interestingly that night I when I showed it to my wife and daughter the lower pitched word  Laurel was far and away the dominant word while all either of them could hear was Yanny. The difference being that I'd been tuning all day. I listened again the next morning with the same result. It  seems that I train myself to filter out higher frequencies while I'm working and have to actively listen for them at days end. I wear ear plugs when I work and have had my hearing tested recently revealing no loss in the last few decades. So I have to think that whatever is happening at day's end is in the mind and not the ears. I'm curious if others have the same experience. I'm including a link to an interactive player that let's one change which frequencies predominate. Give it a try.
    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/05/16/upshot/audio-clip-yanny-laurel-debate.html

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    Karl Roeder
    Pompano Beach FL
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  • 2.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Posted 05-18-2018 09:34
    My kids were doing this yesterday, and all I could hear at first was a combination of both words. It was on an iPhone with the phone in the back seat of the car.  As the phone moved closer to me, I could hear it clearly as "Laurel."  When it moved further away, it went back to the combination of both words.

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    John Formsma, RPT
    New Albany MS
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  • 3.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Posted 05-18-2018 09:35
    I tried it on my phone, with and without headphones, and so far all I could hear was Yanny.

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    "That Tuning Guy"
    Scott Kerns
    www.thattuningguy.com
    Tunic OnlyPure, TuneLab & Easy Piano Tuner user
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  • 4.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 09:41

    I hear Hardy!






  • 5.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Posted 05-18-2018 09:54
    The dress was purple and white.

    ------------------------------
    A hunter's drumbeat steers the stampeding herd,
    His belly growls in hunger to what he sees.
    The mammoth aware blows his mighty trumpet,
    But alas, the caveman tickles the ivories.

    chernobieffpiano.com
    865-986-7720
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  • 6.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 10:48

    I heard "Yalli" over the radio.  Later, in online coverage, I used their slider bar and heard

    it clearly change from one end to the other.  Ruth






  • 7.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 10:58
    ..and I'm hearing something completely different..

    As the second  L in Laurel drops off in frequency and pitch, I hear the second E in Yanni(?)@F4, at any position on the slide. I followed Yanni with a ? because I have yet to hear that word. I'm hearing something different than what has been described here.




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    -Phil Bondi
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  • 8.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 10:03
    When I first heard this on GMA 2 days ago, and again yesterday morning, I could distinctly hear Laurel, spoken by a man's baritone voice.  Then last night, my wife was at her desk in another room, and she kept repeating the word over and over. She heard Laurel, but in my chair in the living room, about 50 feet away, I distinctly heard Yanni, spoken in an woman's low alto voice who was a smoker. First, she walked to me, with the computer repeating the word over and over, and she still heard Laurel. But then I walked into the room where computer was, and I kept hearing Yanni until I got to within about 10 feet of the computer, when all of a sudden the voice changed to the baritone, saying Laurel. I backed away, but I still kept hearing Laurel, even when I went back to my chair in the living room. This was at 11 PM last night. I had only tuned one piano yesterday at 9 AM. 

    I don't understand it.

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    Willem "Wim" Blees, RPT
    Mililani, HI 96789
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  • 9.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 13:21
    FWIW, our son, who lives in Malaysia, says he can hear both names by concentrating on the sound.

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    Willem "Wim" Blees, RPT
    Mililani, HI 96789
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  • 10.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-18-2018 12:54
    Now that's interesting. I got Yanny without a trace of Laurel, till I moved the cursor to the left. One notch to the left is plainly Laurel, but right in the middle is undoubtedly Yanny. I couldn't find any setting where I could hear both at once.

    My computer speakers are set up to enhance the bass somewhat more than the treble, so that would make Yanny even more dominant.

    I'll try again after several hours of tuning, and see if the results are different.

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    Susan Kline
    Philomath, Oregon
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  • 11.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-19-2018 01:49
    I heard it first on the radio and it sounded like some sort of robotic "Yeaohee" so I figured I was a Yanny. I tried it on my laptop at home and it was clearly Laurel to the point I couldn't hear a trace of whatever I heard before. My wife hears Yanny.

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    Anthony Willey
    Easy Piano Tuner
    Shoreline WA
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  • 12.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-19-2018 07:17
    Fairly thorough distillation:
    The True History of 'Yanny' and 'Laurel'
    WIRED remove preview
    The True History of 'Yanny' and 'Laurel'
    If you somehow haven't already over the last few days, listen to this audio recording right now. What do you hear? Is the person saying "Yanny" or "Laurel"? If you heard the second answer, you're technically correct. But more importantly: Here's the backstory of where the audio clip came from-and how it went viral-down to the person who recorded it.
    View this on WIRED >


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    David Skolnik
    Hastings-on-Hudson NY
    914-231-7565
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  • 13.  RE: Yanny/Laurel

    Registered Piano Technician
    Posted 05-20-2018 16:44
    David,
    Thanks for the link, nice to have the back-story. 

    Sheffey Gregory, RPT