This Baby Looks Tight, huh?

knownalien_

audiobliss wrote:

That is very interesting. Had never heard that before.

sure. go to a piano and you have to bang the heck out of it to be able to "feel" the note. But the same rule applies with the upright bass. A piano would have to be much bigger for the waveforms to be able to use the box of the piano. as it is, the waveform doesn't complete itself until it leaves the piano. did that make sense?

lol

audiobliss

Not really, lol. And I've played piano for 7 years.

You're just saying there's not enough area inside the piano for the note to resonate for it to.....what?

lol, sorry; I'm just not following.

reeltrouble1

Has to do with the box, length of the strings, power ratio of the action at the hammer strike or bow and so on, thats why Steinway Grands are 12', there are other laws in effect, curvature of the ear, etc., its a very deep topic, loads of info if you do a search. Basically the strings resonate when struck then a wooden soundboard is utilized, crack the soundboard and your well, screwed. Really amazing stuff you can spend years studying it.

RT1

knownalien_

^^ well, as you know the wave of a really low frequency is huge compared to a higher note's. When you hit the lowest note on a piano (grand piano) the wave doesn't fully develop until after it leaves the piano leaving the wave to use the room to use as a resonance box. as a contrast, the violin is likely the most perfect acoustic instrument in terms of dynamics. It's dealing with higher frequencies and the resonances all fit within the body itself and can use the body of the violin itself to amplify the note. Play the lowest G string loudly and assuming you don't have a pos fiddle, it WILL carry and you WILL feel it. You feel it because the wood of the violin is resonating sympathetically with the waveform. That acts to amplify. All sound is, recall, is compression and rarefaction from the speakers pov. when the driver comes out it is compressing air to "spell" a waveform. When it drives back towards the speaker it causes a "vacumm" in the air: rarefaction. A violin must deal with sound in a similar way, but it creates the waveform differently.

in essence, the reason that a bigger driver (or combined suface area of many) can more easily reporduce lower notes is the same basic reason why a piano would have to be bigger to reproduce (at volume) the lowest fundamental of a very low note. But in acoustic intruments it is the comprimise that has to be made. No one is going to lug around a piano the size of a 20' X 20' room!

lol


p.s this knowledge is from being a classical musican and also having taken physics acoustic classes.

McLoki

It's the wierd digressions like this (the thread started with how an unreleased Polk subwoofer looked remember?) that make this such a cool forum to belong to.

Thanks for the explanation. While much went over my head, it was still very interesting reading...

Michael.

audiobliss

Wow. Very interesting stuff, for sure. Thanks for the replies, both of ya!

knownalien - A classical musician and physics acoustic student...wow!

knownalien_

the physics was 10 years ago. I'm running on fumes now. :lol

reeltrouble1

Very cool KA, there are a very few of us here who do music theory. At PF they were ribbing me about one theory post I did, I get one of those looks, like here he goes again, Teds Random thoughts!!!!

Next up Modal Theory!!!! relax j/k

RT1

knownalien_

^^ you seem to know your stuff. I can't imagine someone trying to rib you about something.

knownalien_

McLoki wrote:

(the thread started with how an unreleased Polk subwoofer looked remember?)

well, to steer the ship right again, I guess you could say that in terms of CLASSICAL music, we really ask a subwoofer to "embellish" what is not heard live. Add to that that we are condencsing a full orchestra into a tiny (avg.) listening room when the performance was in a hall. How is that supposed to translate.

put even more succintly (sp?), subwoofers and classical music do not really mate well in terms of hardcore purity. But hey, Stravinskly wrote fast moving notes in Rite of Spring and damn if we're gonna hear them!!

jdhdiggs

Too bad church organ music is out with this sub

reeltrouble1

jdhdiggs wrote:

Too bad church organ music is out with this sub

hehehehe, good one, get your Baroque (sp) groove on. LOL JD.

KA, just hang around and get to know these guys, no topic or needle is left unturned!!

jdhdiggs

On a serious note the soundhound CD will blow up most subs of this type with church music. A really cool CD if you can find it! Well recorded with a lot of 16Hz notes

knownalien_

yeah, there are plenty of organ examples where you get that 16 hz. The Camille Organ Symphony is a big audiophile test. In a church, the low notes DO carry (as many here likely know) but they are basically using the whole main room as a resonance box. And if you have seen the size of the pipes of REAL church organs, then it is showing exactly what I am talking about in terms of size and it's effect on LFE. I think organ music was probably the first "thumpin'" put out there!

lol