Harmonics

Harmonics are the components of a periodic waveform that sit at whole-number multiples of the fundamental — the second harmonic at double the frequency, the third at triple, and so on.

Because a looping single-cycle waveform repeats exactly, every component it contains is harmonic, and its shape is just a recipe of harmonic amplitudes: a sawtooth rolls off as 1/n, a square keeps only the odd multiples. Wavetable design often comes down to steering harmonics across frames — thinning them for soft frames, pushing them up for aggressive ones.