resonance v projection (also: what is warmth and where are my overtones)

[bloke]

what i currently like is the science measurable stuff that gives reasons as to why we hear things the way we do.

Google "psychoacoustics".

This sounds like I'm discounting, insulting, or making fun, but I'm really not:
Also Google "self-fulfilling prophecy".

[JC2]

Music is an abstract art. It’s also a very subjective experience.

Words about music is also very abstract. You won’t find any concrete definitions on what a ‘warm’, ‘dark’, ‘bright’ sound is etc. because they’re impossible to determine.

Whilst it is somewhat interesting to get into the science of the acoustics, it’s not really important or practical. It’s a bit like analysing the light spectrum of the Mona Lisa. I’ve never had a teacher get into this kind of science. There’s plenty of more productive things we should be working on.

To the original question, I’ll give my own arty-farty definition.

Warm sound: one with a rounded, resonant and beautiful quality lacking in harshness.

Gear choice can help to enhance what the player is doing, but fundamentally a warm sound has to come from the player. Relaxed embouchure and body, wide airstream and few thousand hours in the practice room.

[splat]

Wikipedia has an excellent article on the subject insofar as human perceptions of sound are concerned. But it does not address issues of sound production involving harmonics and intermodulation found in musical instruments. The audio application cited a few posts ago seems to do that well but I need more time to study it. I am more familiar with spectrum analysis having worked with it for many years, though that is not the end all and be all of sound analysis -- good enough for radar transmitters though.

I have no scientific or working knowledge of the graphs or harmonics or modulation of soundwaves, but it's really interesting that you've got some background in it. It's definitely not the be-all and end-all, but maybe it can gives a few clues?

Whilst it is somewhat interesting to get into the science of the acoustics, it’s not really important or practical. It’s a bit like analysing the light spectrum of the Mona Lisa. I’ve never had a teacher get into this kind of science. There’s plenty of more productive things we should be working on.

I sort of agree - I'll also add that playing tuba isn't really important or practical either, it's mostly a lots of fun that sometimes people get paid to do. Sounding good is also extra fun. I am at my most productive when I am not going down internet rabbit holes and actually doing some work - but here we are!

This sounds like I'm discounting, insulting, or making fun, but I'm really not:
Also Google "self-fulfilling prophecy".

I agree that people like to hear what they think they want to hear. And, many people like to think other people hear them play the way that they think they should sound as opposed to how they actually sound.

I am wondering how much (if at all) the engineers who make instruments and mouthpieces and the like are doing any science-y stuff like the post of Rick Denney's. It would be cool to see someone come out with "hey, my instrument gives measurably different overtones / harmonics - have a look at this" , or "the new special shape of my mouthpiece that's made from a special new material gives much more fundamental to the sound - check out these 10 different players A/B testing and their spectrum-analysis-graphs."

But for now I will continue to do some unimportant internet sleuthing on what is clearly my new hot topic: psychotubacoustics!

[UncleBeer]

It would be cool to see someone come out with "hey, my instrument gives measurably different overtones / harmonics - have a look at this"

This is *exactly* why I don't post here often. Your answer was in the first reply. Sometimes you might need to ... ya know ... click the links.

https://www.artim.at/en/bias-for-brasses_basic/

[splat]

It would be cool to see someone come out with "hey, my instrument gives measurably different overtones / harmonics - have a look at this"

This is *exactly* why I don't post here often. Your answer was in the first reply. Sometimes you might need to ... ya know ... click the links.

https://www.artim.at/en/bias-for-brasses_basic/

Thanks for posting anyway! I did have a look but didn't reply to it.

I guess I was more looking for results of tests than a tool, but acknowledge that your reply was spot on - thank you. And thanks for continuing the discussion.

Do you know if this is something that most mouthpiece makers / instrument makers use? It looks like a pretty full featured piece of software.

Would be great to see some test results of different instrument / mouthpiece combinations.

[UncleBeer]

I guess I was more looking for results of tests than a tool

This is a diagnostic & design tool which provides objective test results. Exactly what you were originally asking about

[Mary Ann]

Re: "resonance", the Brass Instrument Analysis System defines this as the amount of acoustic energy which bounces back from the bell (or beyond, actually; google "acoustical end effect") to the mouthpiece, back to the bell, back to the mouthpiece, etc. This sets up a 'standing wave' inside the instrument, fortifying the tube length's fundamental and overtones. A poor design will produce around 15% 'resonance', and a great design will produce as much as 55%.

I missed this the first time but with the emphasis went and took a look at it. I'm starting to see how it is used, but only after I got to the strings portion and saw some equipment. Because the brass refers to "instrument with player" I couldn't (and still can't) figure out how that part is used. I think Walter Lawson had something (likely designed himself) that was maybe less technical but still worked, based on how his instruments, mouthpieces, and bells respond.
But what it has made me think of is the modern stringed instrument makers who are making truly outstanding instruments that are better than the Strads, Guarnari, etc., from "back when." You can now buy Chinese (!!!) more-or-less-factory-made stringed instruments that sound as good as historical instruments that sell for many many times what the "cheap Chinese" ones do. Especially I read about Jay Haide instruments and am in the process of getting a cello. Even pros are discarding their expensive historical instruments for Haide instruments that sell, brand new (!) for less than $10k. I knew that some day makers would figure out how the old guys did it, and now it appears they have. En masse.
And it occurs to me that had I gone into a different area of EE than electric utility function and reliability, I might have headed off into this same direction myself. Founders had degrees in music and EE. Musicians can hear it and engineers can figure it out.

[UncleBeer]

Because the brass refers to "instrument with player" I couldn't (and still can't) figure out how that part is used.

It comes with a transducer head which contains both microphone and speaker. This attaches to any brass mouthpiece, and is able to send a sweep tone (i.e.: all the frequencies) through the instrument and receive the necessary info back from the bell in order to produce diagnostic results.

[peterbas]

.

[Mary Ann]

I'll continue the cello rant here. I've had the 7/8 Jay Haide Stature Montagnana model here for a week now. So I have gotten to know it pretty well.
And had it visit my luthier.
He said -- it would be a lateral transfer from what I got off ebay to this one. This one does have a distinctly better sound, BUT. That sound goes downhill once I start getting up the fingerboard, on all strings but the A. So -- it is a student instrument, no matter how nice a one it is. Students would take years to get where I am in three months, if they started from scratch.

Next step is decide whether it can make me happy or not. Whether I will lament about buying it or about NOT buying it. Time to make a decision, and -- urk.

So I drove back to Southwest Strings and asked to play the finest cello they had in house, no matter the size.
I was given three to try. One of them --- its sound did not turn to mush in 5th position (and it's not me; I'm good enough to tell at least that much.) That one was about $11k out the door. And it helped me with my decision. I would eventually lament keeping the one I've got, because of not being able to get more out of it than it can (Strings are like that; it can't do more than it can do, and the finest player can't make it produce more tone than it is capable of.) As was pointed out to me by a friend yesterday, even though my technique is not at all where it is going to be, he said, "but you are not a student."

So -- I guess I'm going to raise the price window by quite a bit. Look what people pay for vehicles, and they wear out. Cellos do not wear out; good ones get better over time. And as a retired trumpet professor friend said a few years ago when she bought a gold-plated trumpet, "if not now, when?" (I don't need a gold plated anything but I do need it to respond when I play it. That's why I own things like NStars and Hagens.)

[bloke]

It's often insulting to have people ask the "Did you check to see if it's plugged in" types of questions, but/and typically stringed instruments aren't shipped with amazing strings, though new instruments are of course shipped with new strings, and dealers usually ship used stringed instruments with new strings, unless the strings on the instrument are really good already.
It's just like a $40,000 tuba being supplied with $150 mouthpiece:
The manufacturer of the instrument has no way to guess the tastes of the buyers regarding strings, mouthpieces and certainly not bows - though functional bows are usually supplied with low priced to affordably middle priced bowed stringed instruments.

...so - from way over a thousand miles away where I know nothing about your cello - how good are the strings? A really nice set of strings isn't cheap for one of those things... and surely you know this, so I'm apologizing again.