Procedure

The procedure for this series of experiments was remarkably easy. Each of the participants came in individually with a horn that they were used to playing. There were two trumpet players, two trombone players, and a single tuba player, due to difficulty in finding tuba players with free time and competancy.

They were then asked to play a B-flat tuning note on their instrument in the following ways, following a cue indicating that they were being recorded by the computer.
  1. Play a B-flat with a bright tone, as when you play jazz or marching music.
  2. Play a B-flat with a dark, symphonic tone.
  3. Play a B-flat, but allow your cheeks to puff out like Dizzy Gillespie.
  4. Play a B-flat, but close your jaw.
  5. Play a B-flat with the worst possible tone that you can produce.

The order did not vary, and each player was allowed to play each note as many times as they wanted until they felt that they had done as they had been asked. They were then allowed to leave the room.

I then used the spectrometer to determine what the dominant harmonics were and where they fell in relation to the dark tone, which I used as a basis for comparing each of the other tones that the players had produced.

In order to see what I found, please press here.

Back to the Home Page

Back to the Outline