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Re: Slowly becoming flatter and flatter while playing

Author: John Stackpole
Date: 2004-12-29 13:48

Sfalexi noted:

"Also the temperature (although the cold should make it sharper . . . )"

Ooops, not so. The frequency of a note you hear is how fast those sound waves whip past your ears - "cycles per second." The speed of sound varies directly with the (square root of) temperature of the air - warmer means faster, means higher frequency.

Sound speed also varies inversly with the density of air. Warmer = less dense = faster = higher note.

This applies to humidity in the air, too (although I haven't seen any numbers). Moist air - high humidity - is less dense than dry air (even though it "feels" "heavy" but that is a physiological response.)

On high humidity hot summer evenings - real sticky - I have seen fully loaded aircraft abort take-offs because they couldn't get enough lift from the lower density air.

JDS

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