SAXOPHONE ACOUSTICS INTRODUCING A COMPENDIUM OF IMPEDANCE AND….pdfVIP

SAXOPHONE ACOUSTICS: INTRODUCING A COMPENDIUM OF IMPEDANCE AND SOUND SPECTRA Jer-Ming Chen, John Smith and Joe Wolfe, School of Physics, University of New South Wales, Sydney 2052 NSW J.Wolfe@.au We introduce a web-based database that gives details of the acoustics of soprano and tenor saxophones for all standard fingerings and some others. It has impedance spectra measured at the mouthpiece and sound files for each standard fingering. We use these experimental impedance spectra to explain some features of saxophone acoustics, including the linear effects of the bell, mouthpiece, reed, register keys and tone holes. We also contrast measurements of flute, clarinet and saxophone, to give practical examples of the different behaviour of waveguides with open-open cylindrical, closed-open cylindrical and closed-open conical geometries respectively. INTRODUCTION instrument. For each note, there is at least one confi guration Saxophones are made in many sizes. All have bores that are of closed and open tone holes, called a fi ngering, and the largely conical, with a small, fl aring bell at the large end and impedance spectrum for each fi ngering is unique. Impedance a single reed mouthpiece, fi tted to the truncation, that replaces spectra for a small number of fi ngerings on the saxophone have the apex of the cone. The soprano (length 710 mm, including been reported previously [7, 8], but measurement technology the mouthpiece) and smaller saxophones are usually straight. has improved considerably since then [9, 10]. This paper reports Larger instruments (the tenor has a length of 1490 mm) are an online database comprising, for each standard fi ngering on usually bent to bring the keys more comfortably in the reach bo