Klarinet Archive - Posting 000634.txt from 1999/03

From: "Steven J Goldman, MD" <sjgoldman@-----.com>
Subj: RE: [kl] Pitch over the years
Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 12:02:37 -0500

I don't really know the details myself. The best I can come up with right
now is from Encyclopedia Britannica, which states:

The modern study of waves and acoustics is said to have originated with
Galileo Galilei (1564-1642), who elevated to the level of science the study
of vibrations and the correlation between pitch and frequency of the sound
source. His interest in sound was inspired in part by his father, who was a
mathematician, musician, and composer of some repute. Following Galileo's
foundation work, progress in acoustics came relatively rapidly. The French
mathematician Marin Mersenne studied the vibration of stretched strings; the
results of these studies were summarized in the three Mersenne's laws.
Mersenne's Harmonicorum Libri (1636) provided the basis for modern musical
acoustics. Later in the century Robert Hooke, an English physicist, first
produced a sound wave of known frequency, using a rotating cog wheel as a
measuring device. Further developed in the 19th century by the French
physicist Félix Savart, and now commonly called Savart's disk, this device
is often used today for demonstrations during physics lectures. In the late
17th and early 18th centuries, detailed studies of the relationship between
frequency and pitch and of waves in stretched strings were carried out by
the French physicist Joseph Sauveur, who provided a legacy of acoustic terms
used to this day and first suggested the name acoustics for the study of
sound.

"acoustics" Encyclopedia Britannica Online
<http://members.eb.com/bol/topic?eu=117553&sctn=2>

I've just returned from Northwestern U. where I'm a member of the collegeum.
I can't convince them to play pieces late enough to enable me to play the
classical clarinet (baroque clarinet works just are not interesting enough
in my opinion and the instrument is very primitive). So, I perform on
baroque and classical flutes. I'll tell you, the difference in pitch really
makes a difference in the affect of the piece. Couperin's Les Nations just
wouldn't have the impact at 415 or 440 that it does at 392. And Emanual Bach
would not be as effective at 392 as at 415 or 430. The reason, of course is
the effect on the timber of the instrument at the various pitches. I must
admit, however, that the quality scotch we had post rehearsal (I'm not on
call) made the difference seem far less important.

Steve
Glenlivet - I mean Glenview - IL

-----Original Message-----
From: Paulette W. Gulakowski [mailto:pollyg@-----.com]
Subject: Re: [kl] Pitch over the years

What procedure did they use 150 years ago to determine the cycles per
second (or whatever the correct term is)? I am very curious about this.
Thanks,
Paulette

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