I. Science fair Question
Which part of the Banjo will affect the sound coming from the instrument, the pot or the resonator? II. Background Research
Have you ever wondered what makes some instruments sound different than others? The idea of this project is to build a banjo and determine what parts affect the sound that comes out from the instrument. The banjos sound can be affected by size, shape and weight. One of the most important parts of the banjo is the resonator, this paper will discuss this. This information is important because this will affect the quality of music because music is a popular art in todays’ world.
A Banjo is a musical instrument with a long neck, circular body, and strings that are plucked (Webster’s New
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Banjos were used a long time ago, they were first used by slaves that was made of a gourd resonator. The location of the resonator on a traditional banjo is a chamber behind the drum head. The way the banjo works is that when the sound makes its way to the resonator the vibrations echo in the resonator building strength making the sound a banjo has. This is one of the reasons that blue grass banjos are much louder than the traditional folk banjo. Another reason that a banjo has a very different and twangy sound is from its unique body that is much different than a guitar and other stringed instruments which makes it different …show more content…
We use decibels when we don’t even realize it we think to our self how loud or soft a sound is on a regular basis. Decibels are important because they give you an exact amount of loudness or intensity is in a sound, and sometimes sound when it is too intense it can damage our ear drums. Another measurement used to measure sound is bel, for example one decibel is one tenth of a bel. The bel is not used as much as a decibel because the decibel is easier to understand. The way that we hear sound is that the vibration is picked up by our eardrums. And when it gets to our eardrums we can measure it using decibels (Tony). “The volume of sound is the measure of loudness, and to quantify volume we use decibels” (Physics for
Hearing allows us to take in noises from the surrounding environment and gives us a sense of where things are in relation to us. All those little folds on the outside of the ear, called the tonotopic organization, make it so sound waves in the air are directed to the ear canal, where they can be further processed. Once in the ear, the sound waves vibrate the ear drum, which tell the ear exactly what frequency it is sensing. The vibration of the ear drum is not quite enough to send a signal to the brain, so it needs to be amplified, which is where the three tiny bones in the ear come into play. The malleus or hammer, incus or anvil, and stapes or stirrup amplify this sound and send it to the cochlea. The cochlea conducts the sound signal through a fluid with a higher inertia than air, so this is why the signal from the ear drum needs to be amplified. It is much harder to move the fluid than it is to move the air. The cochlea basically takes these physical vibrations and turns them into electrical impulses that can be sent to the brain. This is...
The purpose of this experiment was to determine whether if the sound is affected when it travels through different length pipes. The method used to do this experiment was created by using 5 different PVC pipes in the lengths of 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50 centimeters. Then, using a tuning fork, sound will be produced on one end of the PVC pipe and measured with a decimeter on the other end. This experiment was recorded using 5 trials for each independent level and the average decibels (dB) for each pipe length were recorded.
The unit used to measure the intensity of sound is called the decibel(dB). Sounds that measure up to 75dB are considered to be in the "safe zone". Constant exposure to to sound at these levels are very unlikely to cause any lasting damage to long term hearing. The sound of regular volume conversation measures at around 60dB and the sound of a running dishwasher measures at roughly 75dB. Sounds around the 85dB level are considered a moderate risk to hearing. Exposure at these levels for extened periods of time may lead to some form of damage causing NIHL. Sounds at these levels include heavy traffic and crowded areas at 85dB, active subway stations at 95dB and listening to an mp3 player with ear buds at maximum volume at 105dB in which listening for just 15 minutes can cause permanent damage. Sound at 120dB and above are in the "danger zone". This level of sound is to be avoided at all cost as exposure even for a short pulse will lead to immediate permanent damage. This level includes the sound of ambulance sirens at 120dB, a jet taking off at 140dB and gunshots at 165 dB and above. (Rabinowitz,
The Helmholtz resonance of a guitar is due to the air at the sound hole oscillating, driven by the springiness of the air inside the body. This is analysed quantitatively in Helmholtz Resonance.
Before you can understand the physics of playing the guitar, you must first know the brief history of it. The guitars’ history can be traced back to over 4,000 years ago. This ancient instrument has many theories on how it came to be. The theory with the most evidence states that the guitar was a development from a Greek 4-stringed instrument, and then altered by the Romans to be called the cithara. Soon after, this cithara was then brought to Portugal and Spain where it was changed yet again to an instrument named the Oud. After this, it was combined with the vihuela. Throughout time, insignificant alterations where made to the vihuela. It was not until the end of the 1800’s that a man named Antonio Torres Jurado created what we known as the guitar. To start, he increased the size of the body and neck. He raised the neck and improved the fingerboard with ebony or rosewood. He replaced the tuning pegs with more efficient machine tuners. As a result, he made the guitar louder, more efficient, and he overall improved the sound (History of the Acoustic Guitar) (Guy).
Noise is ubiquitous in our environment. (Pediatrics , 1997) It is undesirable sound, unwanted sound. Sound is what we hear. It is vibration in a medium, usually air. Sound has intensity, frequency and duration. The ability to hear sounds at certain frequencies is more readily lost in response to noise. (Pediatrics , 1997). The further you are from sound the less effect you hear it but the more closer you are to sound the louder it is.
Although bluegrass got its beginning in the United States its roots are long stretching to other countries and cultures that brought their music preference to the beginnings of America. Early settlers to America including those from Ireland, Scotland, England, and even Africa composed music and occupied their time playing new songs about their day to day lives. These songs often reflected life on farms and homesteads for the new settlers. Regularly bluegrass music was played by these settlers in the hills of southern United States; this is where bluegrass music got its first designation, “mountain music” or “country music”. Because of bluegrass’s diminutive outreach it wasn’t until an important invention changed the popularity of this vital music for so many people. “The invention of the phonograph and the onset of the radio in the early 1900s brought this old-time music out of the rural Southern mountains to people all over the United States.” (IBMA (International Bluegrass Music Association))
A timpani is one of the percussion instruments that has a definite pitch. They are also struck by a mallet on the surface of the drum, which is made out of calfskin and is stretched over a copper shell.(1) When analyzing the mallets many notice that they are home made. Timpani’s come in all different sizes, which determines the change in the pitch. They can come in sizes such as a thirty-two inch, twenty-nine inch, twenty-sixth inch, twenty-three inch and the smallest is a twenty inch, which is a higher pitch than the larger timpani’s.(2) Some sound characteristics of a timpani might be evaluated by words such as powerful, deep, booming, or hollow. Timpani’s also create their sound by a petal located at the bottom of the
"The Physics of the Acoustic Guitar - Body." The Physics of the Acoustic Guitar - Body. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 May 2014. .
Wendkos, Zach. “The Evolution of the Electric Guitar”. 21 May 2010. Web. 30 Apr. 2014.
Music and the relationships of music have changed drastically in our society. The course of studies and the evaluations of the applications of the technology of music, the making and the listening of music have changed in the way we listen to music, the styles of music in our society and in the media. The importance of the technology in music today, has, over the past century been charted through the study of musical examples and through viewing how human values are reflected in this century's timely music. There are very many different types of music that are listened to. There are readings, writings, lectures and discussions on all the different types of music.
The best way for you to learn how to tune your banjo is to get a tune pipe or similar device to help you compare the pitch of your banjo to the proper pitch you need to match. It will take some time for you to master this skill, but once you've learned it will make all the difference in how your music sounds & what people think of your playing.
The main reason the metric system is known for its simplicity is because there is only unit of measurement or a base unit for each type of measured quantity measured; length mass, weight, etc… There are a few base units in the metric system but the most common ones which are used are the meter, gram and liter. As an example if ...
Each of the senses receives a different stimulus that allows us to perceive that specific type of information. For hearing the stimulus is sound waves. These are waves of pressure that are conducted through a medium (Martini, 2009). Often this medium is air but it can also be water or a solid object. Each wave consists of a region where the air molecules are gathered together and an opposite region where they are farther apart (Martini, 2009). A wavelength is the distance between either two wave peaks or two wave troughs. The number of waves that pass through a fixed reference point in a given time is the frequency. High pitch sounds have a high frequency where as low pitch sounds have a low frequency (Myers, 2010). The amplitude is the amount of energy, or intensity, in a sound wave. The more energy that a sound wave has, the louder it seems. For us to perceive any of the sound waves around us, they must pass through the external, middle, and inner ea...
What distinguishes sound waves from most other waves is that humans easily can perceive the frequency and amplitude of the wave. The frequency governs the pitch of the note produced, while the amplitude relates to the sound le...