Frequency vs Pitch Distinctions between frequency and pitch must be made if the response or musical perception of a given listener is to be understood. Frequency is a physical attribute of sound whereas pitch is a psychological attribute of sound. The frequency range of the human auditory system has a range from about 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz. Because the mechanisms of the inner ear for each person is unique, everyone's perceptual detection of pitch is not the same. Contrastingly, noise is random and therefore it is not described in terms of pitch.
Pure tones consist of a single sinusoidal component.
Pitch of a pure tone is proportional to the logarithm of frequency. Therefore, in terms of frequency, the logarithmic scale for frequency ratios constantly matches up with any two piano keys. It is consistent with the music scales of most cultures in which tones separated by an octave are considered in some respects musically equivalent and are given the same letter or mnemonic label. In a musical context, the octave is favored over other intervals because the similarity of pitches an octave apart is acknowledged by the same musical note names, which in turn is derived from its lowest fundamental. The construction of a group of simple sine wave tones is equally difficult to determine as we shall see from the construction of Shepard Tones.