Science behind percussion instruments:- Music is generally thought to be an art rather than a science but what is the science behind the production of music? And can three 'tone-deaf' scientists use these principles to make musical instruments and maybe even play a tune? Let's face it, if we can master this challenge anyone can. Firstly, how is sound produced? For sound to occur you need a vibrating source and a medium, and to detect it, you need a receiver. Vibrations from the sound source disturb molecules in the medium. The molecules move at the same rate as the sound source. As the vibration travels through the medium each molecule hits another and returns to its original position. Regions of the medium become …show more content…
The difference between music and noise is that musical sounds are organized into patterns that have pitch and rhythm whereas noise is just random, disorganized sounds. A particular musical note is determined by the number of times that the musical instrument vibrates per second resulting in a sound wave. The number of times that a sound wave vibrates in a second is called its frequency. Scientists measure the frequency of sounds in cycles per second and express the measurement in Hertz. The human ear can detect a range of frequencies. There are frequencies that are too low to detect but can be heard by other creatures, such as whales, and there are frequencies that are too high for us to hear, such as those produced by bats when trying to avoid other objects. Loud high note vs loud low note diagram If producing a note is so simple, why do the sounds made by each instrument in an orchestra or band sound so different? The pitch is the degree of highness or lowness of a musical note. The pitch depends on how rapid the vibrations are i.e. how high the frequency is. A higher pitch has a higher …show more content…
In most stringed instruments the pitch gets higher when the player moves their hand closer to the bottom of the string making the vibrating area shorter. However, Mike's double bass depended on changing the tension of the string to obtain each note. In many stringed instruments, the strings themselves only produce a small fraction of the sound that is heard. The rest is due to resonance from the body of the instrument vibrating in sympathy with the strings. Mike's double base had a huge box and a long string which gave it a very low pitch. Wind instruments:- These instruments work by using vibrating columns of air that amplify an initial sound. In all wind instruments, the length of the column of air determines the general pitch of the instrument. That is why the panpipes played by Ellen used bamboo tubes cut to different lengths to produce various notes. In order for a column of air to vibrate, something must start it going. The small sound produced by blowing over the top of each panpipe tube is greatly amplified within the tube, in much the same way as the body of a stringed instrument amplifies the sound from the string. Percussion