Re: Re: Re: Re: BB-Flat and C...what?!


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Posted by Mike Solms on April 15, 2002 at 14:47:34:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: BB-Flat and C...what?! posted by Rick Denney on April 15, 2002 at 13:11:06:

I am certainly no physicist, but I have read enough about musical acoustics to marvel that any of our instruments work at all. The effects of the mouthpiece, the taper of the tube and the bell flare give brass instruments characteristics of both open and closed tubes. As I understand it, and I'm far from certain that I do, the actual length of the tube is almost never the same as the physical length of the instrument. It even varies from partial to partial- at lower partials the tube most likely ends somewhere inside the bell. Go high enough and the tube will end beyond the end of the bell. There are formulae and computer models for trying to optimize all these factors. Since possibly the most extensive use of these models was made in the design of the Holton Harvey Phillips model (at least according to the advertisements), there might be a little tweaking left to do.


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