Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young · Journey Through the Past

Southern Man

Southern Man is in D minor at 153 beats per minute.

Tempo

153 BPM · Allegromedian of 173 analyses · 151.1–164.2 across the middle eight tenths

Key: D minor1 flat · the key most of the analyses agreed on
Agreement: 73%share of analyses that agreed
Analyses: 173people who ran the extractor
One beat: 392.2milliseconds, 60,000 ÷ BPM
Tuning: 437Hz · -12 cents from A 440
Dynamics: 4.71dB the level wanders from its average
Loudness: 0.667Essentia's 0–1 scale, not dB
Danceability: 1.133Essentia's danceability, 0–3

Source: AcousticBrainz, dump of 2022-06-23 (CC0) · MusicBrainz core data, 2026-09-17 (CC0) · how each number is measured. Measured up to 23.06.2022 — AcousticBrainz stopped collecting in 2022, so nothing released after that date is here.

What the numbers say

173 independent analyses of this recording were submitted to AcousticBrainz. A bare majority of them — 73% — put it in D minor, a key signature of 1 flat. The tempo printed above is the median of the 173 readings; 67% of them land within 2% of it, and the middle eight tenths of them run from 151.1 to 164.2 BPM.

At 153 BPM one beat lasts 392.2 milliseconds, so a sixteenth note is 98 ms and a dotted eighth 294.1 ms — the delay times for this recording. Counted half as fast it is 76.5 BPM, counted twice as fast 306. A score would mark that Allegro, by the ranges this site uses.

The analyses put the reference pitch of the recording at 437 Hz, which is 12 cents below concert A at 440 Hz — the sort of drift a tape machine or a slightly different mastering leaves behind. That is a fact about this transfer of the music, not about how it was played.

The dynamic complexity of the recording measures 4.71 dB: that is how far the level wanders from its own average, so a small number means a loud, flat master and a large one means a recording that still breathes. Its average loudness is 0.667 on Essentia's 0-to-1 scale, which is not decibels and is not comparable to a streaming service's number.

10 other recordings here are in D minor; the ones listed below are the closest in tempo.

Beats per bar are not in this dataset. AcousticBrainz's analysis reports a tempo, a key and a loudness, and no time signature at all, so this page does not print one — a 4/4 here would be a guess dressed as a measurement.

Keys that fit with D minor

Each of these differs from D minor by at most one accidental, or shares its tonic. That is the whole of what a mixing wheel encodes; here the relations are named instead of numbered.

Delay times at 153 BPM

Note value	Beats	Milliseconds	Hertz
Whole note	4	1568.6	0.64
Half note	2	784.3	1.27
Dotted quarter	1.5	588.2	1.7
Quarter note (one beat)	1	392.2	2.55
Quarter triplet	0.667	261.4	3.83
Dotted eighth	0.75	294.1	3.4
Eighth note	0.5	196.1	5.1
Eighth triplet	0.333	130.7	7.65
Dotted sixteenth	0.375	147.1	6.8
Sixteenth note	0.25	98	10.2
Sixteenth triplet	0.167	65.4	15.3
Thirty-second note	0.125	49	20.4

Half time 76.5 BPM · double time 306 BPM. Every row is one beat (392.2 ms) times the fraction in the second column.

The same title by somebody else

Southern ManNeil YoungD minor163BPM

Matched on the title alone, so this list can hold a different song that happens to share a name. Nothing here claims one is a cover of the other.

Closest in key and tempo

Recordings in D minor, ordered by how near their tempo is to 153 BPM. A calculation, not a recommendation.

All songs in D minor All songs at 153 BPM D minor at 150–159 BPM Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

MusicBrainz collapses 25 recording ids into this one. Recording id 25a0744a-44ad-4bed-93a5-5a6b6ad077a8.