h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi, Gnomon,

I have started writing an Entry on wind instruments, with my personal focus on brass instruments, as you suggested in the Low Brass thread.

The shell of the Entry can be found at http://www.h2g2.com/A473528. How about a joint venture on this topic? I could cover the brass part, and you might play the woodwinds.

A title might be "A Guide to Wind Instruments". And why not try getting it into the Edited Guide? Just tell me what you think.

I'll certainly write about Woodwinds if you want to write about Brass. If you want, you can rip off stuff from my two articles, "The Trumpet" and "The Trombone". These are about specific instruments. I think what we're talking about here should be general principles about the family rather than specific instruments.

You've made quite a good start. I would hesitate before putting harmonicas and other free reed instruments in with the woodwinds. They are really a different category. Although they use reeds to make the note, they do not rely on a column of resonating air. The pitch is determined purely by characteristics of the reed itself, such as length, thickness and so on. I think free reed instruments would have to be treated in a separate section.

I'm a bit busy at the moment, but I'll start on the woodwinds soon.

Gnomon

I'll definitely look at your Entries, and I appreciate your courtesy to let me use what I find there. No need to re-invent the wheel .

Maybe I'll open a new section for the free reed instruments (harmonicas, etc. ...) I just wanted to mention them, as some registers of pipe organs use harmonica-like metal reeds and a resonating pipe.

Thanks for your help, I appreciate that

I have opened a thread at the Musicians' Guild's Musical Related Entries page. Please have a look at it, it leads to my Entry on brass instruments. Tell me what you think, I would like to improve and finetune it before it goes to the Peer Review eventually. http://www.h2g2.com/F52434?thread=88908&post=726387

Your brass entry looks good! I still haven't had a chance to write the equivalent woodwind entry. Everytime I start, I think of another instrument and say "how will that fit into the scheme?". Then I have to reorganise the whole article.

I want to avoid a huge list of categories. So far I have:

Flutes
Open edge flutes
Concert flute
Traditional and Baroque flute
Pan pipes
Shakuhachi
Duct Flutes
Recorder
Tin Whistle
Ocarina
Flageolet
Tabor Pipe
Reeds
Double reeds
Mouth-held reeds
Oboe family
Bassoon family
Sarrusophone
Capped reeds
Crumhorn
Snake charmer
Bagpipes
Single reeds
Clarinets
Saxophones

See what I mean? That would put anybody off. Maybe I should just list off a few different attributes a woodwind can have, such as edge, single reed, double reed, conical bore, cylindrical bore, and then list all the instruments with a very brief description of each.

I had the same problems with my Entry. My first intention was to write something about various brass instruments, how differences in lentgh and bore affect the specific sound, etc. ...

But then I drifted more and more into the tuning and harmonics thing, which is, however, very interesting too!

I had a list with brass instruments which was almost as long as your woodwinds list, so I decided to limit it to the most common families plus some 'rarities', like the cornett, or some of the 'non-brass' brass intruments.

Would you mind having a look at some of the formulas? There have been some moments when I was not quite sure of what I was writing. I did lots of research on the topic, but the results might need some verification or plausibility checking, as I'm not a brass instrument builder, nor a mathematician, nor a physician.

Good Luck with your Entry!

Jeremy,

Sorry it took me so long to get back to you. I have been doing some research. Real research, not just looking things up on the web. I have been measuring various instruments which I own and have decided you are not right to say that the fundamental note of a pipe is the one wavelength sits inside the pipe so that pipe length = sound wavelength. Some initial results are at http://www.h2g2.com/A482771

Disregard the clarinet in this, as it makes sound in a different way from all the others. The lowest note on the trumpet that I can play (with none of the valves pressed) is Bb3, the note two semitones below middle. This is the "first harmonic". The fundamental, or pedal, note is much lower, but I can't produce it because my trumpet playing is not good. I can't measure what note it is but would assume that it is Bb2. This means the ratio of wavelength to length is 2.2. So for most instruments except the clarinet the ratio is therefore between 2.1 and 2.4, which seems to suggest:

"The fundamental note is formed when half a wavelength of sound sits neatly within the length of the pipe".

The rest of the article is good, but there are a few language points worth tidying up. I have studied music for many years and have never heard the term "dodekaphonic". It is always known in English as the "twelve-tone scale". Are you from Germany? This could be a case of a word that is commonly used in Germany being transferred into German English.

The correct spelling is "length", not "lenght".

There are one or two minor things which we can tidy up later.

Thanks, Gnomon, for your help, I appreciate that.

You are right, I am from Germany (Bavaria, to be precise). I'll include your hints in my Entry, which I have now submitted to the PR.

I have not studied music (theory, that is), so I would appreciate any help to translate my 'musical english' layman's language into the correct diction. Please tell me if the following assumptions are correct:

1. What I called 'basic tone' should be 'fundamental', or 'pedal'?
2. 'Dodekaphonic' is no musical term in English? (I was so proud of that word, as I'm a big fan of foreign languages!)

I think that we are both right, as far as the trumpet's fundamental tone is concerned: The standard lowest natural on the trumpet is Bb3, that's right. But: this is the first harmonic (if we consider the fundamental to be harmonic zero) of the trumpets theoretical scale. Due to mouthpiece restrictions the fundamental (Bb2) can hardly be played, as the vibrating lip length is too short. Try to mount a bigger mouthpiece into the trumpet, and it's much easier.

On other brass instruments, esp. the deeper ones (trombone, tuba, etc.) the fundamental is well within reach. This leads to the somehow funny situation that on a trombone without any triggers you can play the fundamental (let's say Bb1), then comes a gap of 6 semitones, and the next playable tone is E2 (slide position 6 or 7 (?), I'm not familiar with the trombonists' diction, so let's call it 'fully extended'). From this point upwards the trombone player has a (sometimes even more than ) chromatic choice of notes.

So I'd like to defend my assumtion that tube length = fundamental wave length. Further discussion is very much welcome (yes, yes, yes!!)

I haven't time to look at this at the moment, but later I'll try. The term "pedal" is only used for brass instruments. "Fundamental" is a good name because it applies to any sort of instrument.

I always called the fundamental note the first harmonic, calling the note at twice the frequency the second harmonic. This has the advantage that the seventh harmonic is at 7 x frequency, for example. But your way is acceptable; I've seen it in books.

More later.

Some spelling and grammar:

lentgh --> length
okarina --> ocarina
a air vibration --> an air vibration
simplyfied --> simplified
440 1/sec --> 440 cycles/sec
it's --> its (when it means "belonging to it")
a fictive tube --> a theoretical tube, a fictional tube,
the tend to sound good --> they tend to sound good
perfect forth --> perfect fourth
dodekaphonic --> dodecaphonic (rare word, but does exist!)
"," used in numbers --> "." (eg 1.1817 not 1,187)
horny -->don't use this word. It means "wanting sex". Try "Animal Horn or Shell Brass Instruments".
gamba --> viol

Two other points:

Viooncello is a bass violin. Missing instrument is called "tenor violin". Not made any more. There was also a violin bigger than the violoncello (violone) but it is really a double-bass violin.

The interval with a frequency ratio 7:6 is not a major second. It is an interval which is not used in western music as it sounds out of tune. The 8:7 interval also sounds out of tune. The 8th harmonic (7 x fundamental) is normally avoided for this reason. A major second is the interval 9:8. Better just omit this line.

I've found this in Encyclopaedia Britannica:

"In an open tube, the standing wave of the lowest possible frequency for that particular length of tube (in other words, the fundamental) has antinodes at each end and a node in the centre. This means that an open tube is one-half wavelength long."

Getting back to the trumpet, my trumpet is 1.335 m long (approximately). The fundamental (pedal) tone is Bb2 = 116.54 Hz. Speed of sound is 344 m/s at 20 degrees C. Wavelength = 2.952 m. Ratio of Wavelength to Trumpet length = 2.2. An "ideal" trumpet would have a ratio of 2.

Thanks, Gnomon, that helps me a lot!

Don't give up on this project, after the work you have put into it. Take a few days off and then start with a fresh view. Don't be afraid to completely rewrite if necessary.

I've started my guide to woodwinds. It has ended up with far less mathematics in it than I thought it would. It is at:

http://www.h2g2.com/A490439

I have now completed my Introductory Guide to Woodwind Instruments. I don't think it is suitable for publication as an Edited Guide Entry, as it is too specific and technical. What do you think?