Physics

[JayW]

I'd like to know where that quote is from.

If you have ever used just the mouthpiece of a brass or reed instrument, you know that the vibration of your lips or the reed alone does not make a sound with any particular pitch

That is so far from the truth....that is what mouthpiece buzzing is for...so use your sight singing skills to BUZZ the tune. Your lips/air flow are what create different pitches. Everything else just amplifies that. Fast air---faster vibration = higher pitch Slow air---slow vibration = lower pitch.

[Anterux]

It's sad what sometimes we "learn" from physicists...

Or that is completley out of context. Or it's simply false.

We can surely buzz in tune. the sound isn't so good as when we have the rest of the instrument. but should be as good and focused as posible. and in tune!

If the sound of buzzing had the same quality of the sound of a tuba we didnt need a 4000$ instrument. (in that case a mouthpiece would cost 4000$). but buzzing is an execent procedure of training and warming up giving us almost imidiatly good results.

sound and noise... noise and sound... music and physics...

[Anterux]

There are some good articals on that subject. There are good physics books.

I'm very interessed in the physics theories aplied to music.

and when they write something that we can see they don't have the faintest idea of the real world, it goes bad on my nerves.

sorry for clumsy English.

[Leland]

Well, in nitpicky legal standards, it's correct -- that the buzzing alone won't produce musical sound.

The same player can buzz the same noise and get differently colored sounds out of different horns.

The buzz does create the frequency, but the horn (and a bunch of other stuff) colors it to make better-sounding noise.

[Anterux]

Well, in nitpicky legal standards, it's correct -- that the buzzing alone[/i] won't produce musical sound

Those "nitpicky legal standards" are (I cant find the word in English...) subjective? and maybe obsolete?

noise? musical sound?

The noise I produce with the mouthpiece has a nice amout of musical sound.

And the sound I produce with the tuba has a (not so) nice amount of noise.

This is all pretty much subjective.
How about musical noise?

If physics cant explain what we can do, the way we do it, something is wrong with the theory...

Buzzing well, produces an (at least almost) periodic wave.

playing with the tuba well, produces a different (at least almost) periodic wave.

of course these are just subjective opinions.

Yes, many things change when we use the whole tuba, but puting it the way it comes in that book makes no sence to me. Any PITCH we can play with the tuba we can play with mouthpiece only.

"you know that the vibration of your lips or the reed alone does not make a sound with any particular pitch."

No. this isn't right.

[Captain Sousie]

Well, in nitpicky legal standards, it's correct -- that the buzzing alone won't produce musical sound.

Well, if you consider the definition of music as 'sound organized in time' the legal standard would make any sound, pretty or not, potentially musical.

[Shockwave]

[quote="Luca"]“… The mouthpiece simply creates a mixture of different frequencies and the resonating air column acts on a particular set of frequencies to amplify a single note, turning noise into music.â€

[Art Hovey]

I guess what Zitzewitz is saying is that HE can't get a clean tone out of a tuba mouthpiece, and I am ready to believe that. I am not familiar with that author, but I have a pretty low opinion of some of the other science textbooks published by Glencoe. Please don't make the mistake of confusing hack textbook authors with real scientists. If you want to learn more about the subject read somebody who knows what he is writing about, (such as Benade, for starters) rather than someone who knows how to land writing contracts.

[Chuck(G)]

I'll jump in here and say that the physics text author wasn't too far off the mark.

Go ahead, buzz your tuba mouthpiece--what do you hear? A recognizable fundamental tone mixed with a bunch of related and unrelated other frequencies. That's why it's a "buzz" and not a "hum".

Stick a tuba on to your mouthpiece and the system changes. Not only does the tuba clean the buzz up by virtue of resonance, reinforcing only certain frequencies, but the resonance effect interacts with the lips themselves, modifying the mechanics of the buzz. Yes indeed, the very mechanical motion of a buzz is modified by the additon of a close-coupled resonator.

So what comes out of your tuba isn't an amplifed buzz, but a cleaner tone consisting mostly of the fundamental and odd overtones.

The result doesn't really sound like a louder version of the unreinforced free-air buzz, does it?

Maybe the wording in the textbook was awkward, but not completely off-base, IMOHO.

[Ryan_Beucke]

The textbook is wrong and right. I'm guessing this isn't a college physics textbook, right? And don't you remember all of the stuff you learned in school that turns out to be a stretch of the truth? Anyone who has taken a few sequential theory classes can relate. You learn one set of rules, and then the next class you learn to break them. The book is trying to simplify it, and I agree that it is worded pretty badly, but I don't think that it's completely wrong.

For example, it says using the reed or mouthpiece alone does not produce any particular pitch, whereas with the horn, it does. That's because with the mouthpiece, you're just creating varying speeds of vibrations. Add the horn, and you create standing waves, which for the most part adhere to the harmonic series of the length of tube that it is going through. The horn is definitly not just an amplifier for the mouthpiece, it is the medium for the standing waves to exist in.

It's a silly way of wording it, but it's somewhat right. Plus, do you expect the book to say everything completely as it is? Then it would have to explain all about how each tone on different instruments contains a whole bunch of other pitches in it, with their intensity varying by the timbre of the instrument. You can see how it would get really complicated.

[Kevin Hendrick]

... do you expect the book to say everything completely as it is? Then it would have to explain all about how each tone on different instruments contains a whole bunch of other pitches in it, with their intensity varying by the timbre of the instrument. You can see how it would get really complicated.

Reality often is complicated. We sometimes make "simplifying assumptions" for the sake of clarifying a particular model, and that's OK -- as long as we don't forget that the assumptions we've made distance our model (to some extent) from reality. An old story (that many of you have probably heard) may serve to illustrate:

A physics professor came to the end of the winter-spring semester & realized that he had 4 months of free (and un-paid) time ahead of him. He decided to place an advertisement in the newspaper offering to teach groups of people -- any subject. After all, he thought, how hard can it be? On the second day, he got a telephone call from a group of dairy farmers who wanted to learn how they could increase the milk production of their herds. He set a date 2 weeks away, and started reading about the subject. The day finally arrived, and the professor drove to the farm where he was to meet his students. He set up his chalkboard, drew a large circle on it, and started: "Consider a spherical cow of uniform density ..."

[Shockwave]

Though there is a little bit of hiss that you can hear when buzzing on a mouthpiece alone, the vast majority of the sound is a repeating waveform and therefore contains only harmonics of the fundamental frequency. The part about "turning noise into music" and the description of the horn amplifying just a certain set of pitches from noise generated by the mouthpiece is just completely wrong. The description implies that the instrument chooses to amplify only a certain set of frequencies from a mixture of frequencies the buzzing lips generate in the mouthpiece. Aside from the insignificant amount of hiss, there is no mixture of frequencies from which to select, only one solitary harmonic series of which all the tones are amplified by the horn if it is tuned properly.

If you wear earplugs, buzzing on a mouthpiece and playing a tuba both sound buzzy.

-Eric

[Rick Denney]

I am confused.

Don't worry, you are in good company.

I can buzz a recognizable pitch using just my lips. As Chuck says, that buzz includes enough of the fundamental frequency to make the pitch recognizable, and a lot of unrecognizable noise on top of it.

When I put my lips to a mouthpiece, the mouthpiece amplifies some frequences and inhibits others. This cleans a bit of the noise off the sounds, and lets a bit more of the fundamental (and its harmonics) come through.

When I put the mouthpiece in the tuba, the instrument amplifies some frequences and inhibits others. This cleans off (hopefully) most if not all of the remaining noise, leaving only the amplified fundamental and its harmonics. The particular mix of harmonics is what gives it the characteristic tuba tone.

In physics terms, we have to use descriptions that have meaning in the frequency domain, since it is vibration we are describing. In the frequency domain, we describe resonance using the term impedance. The embouchure has a characteristic impedance, which is a broad, flat curve covering a wide range of frequencies. The flatness of it is what makes the noise. The peak of it surrounds the fundamental, and that's why we recognize the pitch.

The impedance of the mouthpiece is a little less broad and a little less flat. Thus, it impedes some of the noise elements.

The impedance curve of the tuba (as with any musically tuned and highly resonant chamber) is a series of spikes that are harmonic with the fundamental. That impedance curve impedes the parts of the buzz coming out of the mouthpiece that are not harmonic with the fundamental, which means it weeds out the noise frequencies.

The resulting sound is the series of resonance peaks, provided by the tuba, superposed on top of the broad, flat resonance curve of the mouthpiece and lips. If the buzzing frequency is not harmonic with the resonance peaks of the tuba (as when you buzz the wrong pitch for the valves you have in play), many of those resonance peaks will be impeded, and if you get a sound at all, it will be very dull and weak. A weak buzz will not fill up the resonance peaks of the instrument, which is why a poor player sounds bad even on a great tuba.

If you want a physics text that actually describes how musical instruments work, get The Physics of Musical Instruments by Fletcher and Rossing. Bring your math skills, though it's pretty understandable if you just have a conceptual understanding of calculus, rather than the ability to work the integrals and derivatives (that would describe me--I hate working integrals and am no good at it). The book is available from Amazon.

If you want something a little less mathy, try Benade's Horns, Strings, and Harmony. But its discussion of impedance isn't as strong as Fletcher and Rossing.

Rick "suggesting that knowing the physics doesn't make it any easier" Denney

[The Impaler]

Just to throw something different in here, and probably something that'll get some negative responses, I'd like to drop everyone a line that seriously helped me that I got from Patrick Sheridan:

"paralysis by analysis"

Here's what I need to know (physically speaking) about making my horn work:

AIR = BUZZ = SOUND

By that equation, if I work my air, my buzz will get better, and therefore, my sound will get better. Being someone who has studied and 'analyzed' the more intricate physical workings of how we make music, I've found that overly-involved analytical thinking can negatively affect playing. When I'm playing, I'm not thinking about exactly what makes my horn work. What I'm thinking about is blowing inspired chunks of air that will allow me to communicate to whomever my audience at the time is, be it in recital or in a classroom with beginners.

I know this might not be terribly popular, but I just thought I'd throw a lifeline out to anyone who might be stuck where I was once.

[Rick Denney]

..."paralysis by analysis"

Here's what I need to know (physically speaking) about making my horn work:

AIR = BUZZ = SOUND

Yes, but...

Who put the requirement that a knowledge of the relevant physics was needed to play better? I don't remember seeing that. It's a different subject, worthy of discussion in its own right to those who are interested in the topic.

Understanding and analysis do not automatically lead to paralysis. Arnold Jacobs was the first to use that term in relation to tuba playing (or so he claimed), and he preached the warning you quote at every opportunity. But I guarantee you that he had a very deep understanding of both the physics and the physiology of the tuba and its players. I just listened, again, to that 1973 master class recording, and there was no shortage of discussion of "primary shape change" and "palpating frontal regions", etc.

Rick "who does NOT think about physics when playing the instrument" Denney

[Chuck(G)]

Here's what I need to know

AIR = BUZZ = SOUND

Horsepucky! This is a trite saying whose only purpose is to remind you to breathe and use a good embouchure.

How about keeping an open throat or tongue low in the mouth to make better use of the bronchial resonances? How about the instrument itself? How do you tune it? What makes a good instrument the way it is?

By your logic, you just throw enough air at it and forget about tuning and tonguing and what goes on behind the lips.

When we say "All I need to know is <fill in a trite saying>", we do a great disservice to those who used simple sayings to make a complex topic understandable. Arnold Jacobs, who used the above saying quite a bit, dedicated a lot of his own gray matter to the subject of physics and physiology to better understand how musical sounds are produced.

You could scarcely do better than to emulate his example. Not all musicians are idiots.

(sorry for the rant)

[The Impaler]

When we say "All I need to know is <fill in a trite saying>", we do a great disservice to those who used simple sayings to make a complex topic understandable. Arnold Jacobs, who used the above saying quite a bit, dedicated a lot of his own gray matter to the subject of physics and physiology to better understand how musical sounds are produced.

Where do you think I got that little equation? Who do you think that Pat Sheridan got it from? Isn't it just slightly possible that I'm doing the same thing that you mentioned above?

How about keeping an open throat or tongue low in the mouth to make better use of the bronchial resonances?

Yes, I utilize both of those techniques. However, I think the vowel "O" when I play and accomplish both without overanalyzation. In my current line of work, I get brass (and woodwind) players to play with more open, resonant sounds by simply working shape (O), and air. For me, to tell a student to open their throat would be, well............

Horsepucky!

[Tubadan]

Just to throw something different in here, and probably something that'll get some negative responses, I'd like to drop everyone a line that seriously helped me that I got from Patrick Sheridan:

"paralysis by analysis"

Here's what I need to know (physically speaking) about making my horn work:

AIR = BUZZ = SOUND

By that equation, if I work my air, my buzz will get better, and therefore, my sound will get better. Being someone who has studied and 'analyzed' the more intricate physical workings of how we make music, I've found that overly-involved analytical thinking can negatively affect playing. When I'm playing, I'm not thinking about exactly what makes my horn work. What I'm thinking about is blowing inspired chunks of air that will allow me to communicate to whomever my audience at the time is, be it in recital or in a classroom with beginners.

I know this might not be terribly popular, but I just thought I'd throw a lifeline out to anyone who might be stuck where I was once.

I think this equation would be more accurate as:

If air, then buzz.
If buzz, then sound.

I think this because, yes, when you improve your air, your buzz will improve. And when you improve your buzz, your sound will improve. However if you improve your sound, it doesn't necessarily mean that your air improved... or your buzz. Compare this to "It is raining, therefore the ground is wet." and "The ground is wet, therefore it is raining." Just because the ground is wet doesn't mean that is raining, but when it rains the ground gets wet.


Just my thoughts.

[Rick Denney]

Where do you think I got that little equation? Who do you think that Pat Sheridan got it from? Isn't it just slightly possible that I'm doing the same thing that you mentioned above?

I don't think it was the equation that annoyed Chuck, but rather the "all I need to know" part, or more likely, the implied extension of that to "all YOU need to know". The equation gets the thinking in the right direction, but as we progress, we surely learn more, and that knowledge helps us.

Permit me what seems an unrelated story. A few years back, I was involved in triathlon. This was a foolish enterprise at first, because I could not swim aerobically and would be gasping for air after one length of the pool. So, I took swimming lessons and swam four times a week with a master's swim program. I learned how to swim aerobically enough to swim the 2.4 miles of the swim portion of Ironman USA three years later with a solidly average time. I did better in the swim relative to other participants than I did on the bike or in the marathon, which is a bit surprising given that I came to triathlon from a cycling background.

The point of this story is that the best swimmers never really thought about technique. I'm talking about the Olympic-class swimmers (one of whom was my coach when I lived in Dallas). They jump in the water and just swim. They know what going fast feels like, and they make a myriad of unconscious adjustments to go fast. The key word there is "unconscious". They are focused on the result. They know that if they turn their hand a particular way, their catch will grab a bit more water, and if they can stretch their shoulder ligaments with a bit more flexibility, they can make a smaller hole in the water. They just do it without thinking about it, right from the start.

But what about the rest of us? How do we learn that, even though we have no feel for the water as do the greats? We can't use trial and error, because we don't know what a successful trial feels like.

The good coaches study those few remarkable swimmers, and understand for the rest of us what it is that they do that makes their greatness possible. Then, they teach it to us. And they teach it the same way we learn music, by focusing on the feel we have in the water. But they still drill us on specific physical activities that will position our bodies in the water so we can experience that feel. Some swimmers, once they experience that feel, will go on to become great swimmers, perhaps. Most won't, but they will get good enough to enjoy it. But even they will have to drill the elements of a good swim stroke until it becomes automatic. While they are drilling, they are not thinking about going fast in the water, but rather they are thinking about making sure they turn their hand the way they've been taught, and so on, until they do it out of habit. Then, they turn their minds to the feel of the water.

That's exactly how most of us learn to play music. Yes, we get in our own way when we think too much about the process of technique when we are trying to play music. But we must build those processes into our subconscious one way or another if we are to succeed. We are either born with it, or someone teaches it to us and we learn. Once we learn the move, we have to go beyond the move to bury it into our subconscious so we can focus our intelligence on the music. There is absolutely nothing about this process that is antithetical to the way Jacobs taught or the way Sheridan teaches, based on the examples that I have seen.

I took lessons with Mike Sanders, who was himself a long-time student of Jacobs, many years ago, and he tried to get me to start moving air. He didn't do it with simple equations. He did it using three methods: 1.) he demonstrated what moving lots of air looked like and sounded like (and the sound of that is still in my head nearly 20 years later), 2.) he drilled me on air movement outside the domain of melody ("tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-to-tu-tu-tuuuu-inhale-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tu-tuuuu...), and 3.) he had me buzz on the mouthpiece (which eliminates the helping resonance of the instrument and thus requires more air). These techniques go far beyond your simple equation.

But I still don't think about them when I play, any more than I think about how I turn my hand during the catch portion of my swim stroke.

Rick "eschewing the obfuscation of being simplistic" Denney

[Rick Denney]

In ideal phyisics conditions the textbook is true. If we had that fifty-something valved tuba (I know all of you have seen the picture) we would just have to find the perfect buzz and hold it pressing down the valves to make the column longer or shorter to make sure the standing waves produced by the buzz end on an antinode after completing the required harmonics to produce a note.

The pulse from the lips must coincide with the returning vacuum between successive compression waves reflecting back from the end of the bell to get resonance and a reinforcing pattern. Without that, maintaining that frequency is very difficult. Even without friction, we must buzz our lips at the correct basic frequency to resonate with the instrument.

Rick "who may have missed the point" Denney