Don't pluck it. Blow it!

Started by anotherjim, July 27, 2019, 10:06:57 AM

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jfrabat

How the heck did he discover that???
I build.  I fix.  I fix again.  And again.  And yet again.  (sometimes again once more).  Then I have something that works! (Most of the time!).

Mark Hammer

You know how you can blow over the top of an empty beer or soda bottle and make a sound like a pan-pipe?  Well, the next time you come across one of those very large plastic jugs that are used for water coolers, and it is empty and headed for a refill, take the rubber seal off the top and blow across it, pursing your lips like you're playing flute or trumpet.  Place the bottle against your chest as you blow, and get ready for a deep sensory experience.

anotherjim

It is fairly obvious, but we don't usually have a narrow and controllable jet of compressed air to hand.

Probably, it will cool the strings quite a bit and make them go sharp, but you can blow out the dust that lives around the pickups at the same time as you play!

EBK

#4
Would be fun to whip out a can of compressed air during a gig and start playing the strings with it.  Well, it would probably be fun until the air filled with difluoroethane and Bitrex and everyone is high as a kite and gagging/puking.   :icon_razz:
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ElectricDruid

Very interesting!

Ok, so now I've watched the video, and I'm wondering what's going on physically. Aside form the soft attack, why should using blown air to excite the strings produce such a different sound to a pluck? What's the physics of that?
Does he carefully choose different points along the string to blow the air to emphasise certain harmonics? (I'd guess "Probably" but I wasn't watching that closely first time through) But why doesn't plucking in the same location produce the same sound? Please enlighten me, oh masters of physics! (there must be a couple of Physicists on here somewhere!)

And what was going on with the bells? I didn't get that. Aside from playing a chime, which helps the illusion, the sound was not bad - it had that "FM clang" quality. He'd split the strings with the picks, and was then plucking both sides simultaneously? I couldn't see/work it out.

Excellent stuff, anyway - "prepared guitar", I suppose.

Fancy Lime

Quote from: ElectricDruid on July 27, 2019, 02:36:00 PM
Very interesting!

Ok, so now I've watched the video, and I'm wondering what's going on physically. Aside form the soft attack, why should using blown air to excite the strings produce such a different sound to a pluck? What's the physics of that?
Does he carefully choose different points along the string to blow the air to emphasise certain harmonics? (I'd guess "Probably" but I wasn't watching that closely first time through) But why doesn't plucking in the same location produce the same sound? Please enlighten me, oh masters of physics! (there must be a couple of Physicists on here somewhere!)
...
Well, I'm not a Master of Physics but I think what you are looking for is a Master Psychology, which I am neither. Not like that is stopping me to ramble on about it, though. I assume you mean how he gets the different brass instrument sounds and the clarinet, correct? I don't think they are different sounds at all. It just sounds kind of like a brass instrument and then he plays different types of melodies that your ear knows as typical trumpet, typical tuba or typical French horn melodies. That, plus he displays the supposed instrument in the corner, with name and all. Playing on the lowest or the the highest strings seems to sound a bit different, as does playing high or low frets. And playing several strings at once makes a different as to the "perceived instrument" but he seems to always blow on about the same spot. I think its mostly a cunning way of making your ear hear what it wants to hear. Humans are quite bad at "really" hearing something accurately and very, very good at hearing the confirmation of what we expect to hear. Yanny or Laurel, anyone? I'm always amazed how stupid and smart we are at the same time.

That aside: it does sound great, doesn't it?

Cheers,
Andy
My dry, sweaty foot had become the source of one of the most disturbing cases of chemical-based crime within my home country.

A cider a day keeps the lobster away, bucko!

amptramp

I will never see someone play air guitar again without thinking, wait a minute, playing a guitar with air sounds just like a brass instrument.  This was so great I'm going to sell my air guitar on eBay.

Ice-9

Quote from: ElectricDruid on July 27, 2019, 02:36:00 PM
Very interesting!

And what was going on with the bells? I didn't get that. Aside from playing a chime, which helps the illusion, the sound was not bad - it had that "FM clang" quality. He'd split the strings with the picks, and was then plucking both sides simultaneously? I couldn't see/work it out.

Excellent stuff, anyway - "prepared guitar", I suppose.

The bells is easy and something I used to do in the late 80's ( I stole the idea from Micheal Schencker). I did it a little different from this video but I expect the physics is the same.
To do this my way, take two strings and lift one over the over which can easily be done by lifting say the 'D' string and pulling it over so it overlaps the 'G' string then pluck the two strings, Instant bells and by moving fret position you will get a different bell note.

This I think is harmonics from the crossing point of the two strings which also cause a ring modulation to produce the bell sound. For an example of this listien to Michael Shencker Group album 'one night at the Budokan' I think the song is called Courvoisier Concerto.

The other air gun thing is brilliant and something I have never seen before.
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Sanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting the same result. Mick Taylor

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EBK

There's a brief part near the beginning of the clip where he picks the guitar to show the "natural" sound without the air, and it produces an ethereal, unnatural sound with a very subdued attack.  Has me wondering if compression and reverb are 90% of the effect.
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Rob Strand

Very cool tricks.  He's got some sort of paper over the strings but he seems to get the sound when fretting which will remove the effect of the paper.

The big question is can he play Song of the Wind.
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anotherjim

I agree with Andy that there is an element of psychological trickery playing on cultural expectations. That said the effect is close enough to work. You can play with some elements like attack with judicious finger positioning about the frets.

I'm guessing the air jet needs to be about 1/4 string length to be the most effective, but you have the choice of on-off and changing distance to control it quite a lot.

Cultural expectations usually work the other way in my experience. When I first heard "Strawberry Fields Forever" I never for one moment thought that start was flutes. I assumed they'd found some old wooden pipe organ/harmonium thing for it. Even though the sound is from real flutes, it just never (and still don't) sound like flutes playing to me.

pruttelherrie

Quote from: ElectricDruid on July 27, 2019, 02:36:00 PM
Aside form the soft attack, why should using blown air to excite the strings produce such a different sound to a pluck? What's the physics of that?
A pluck is a single displacement of the string (strong attack, then decay), while the air is a continuous excitation, like an e-bow does. Or a violin bow, for that matter!

R.G.

Air on a resonant string amounts to the string being driven by the "hiss" of air across it. If I were trying to do this more or less electronically, I'd use an  e-bow-ish string driver and excite it with noise. A PIC with a pseudorandom hiss output ought to do it. At least that ought to be a good start.
R.G.

In response to the questions in the forum - PCB Layout for Musical Effects is available from The Book Patch. Search "PCB Layout" and it ought to appear.

PRR

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Rixen

The excitation is caused by vortex shedding, happens with roof rack bars, lamp posts and even buildings. Tall stacks have helical structures to break up the vortices.

Doesn't need to be a strong wind, needs to be the right speed. Look at the trees in this clip, they are barely moving, but one pole is shaking alarmingly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6xnuqE8q7k

EBK

Is this phenomenon at all related to the Takoma Narrows Bridge disaster?
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Rob Strand

QuoteThe excitation is caused by vortex shedding, happens with roof rack bars, lamp posts and even buildings. Tall stacks have helical structures to break up the vortices.

Doesn't need to be a strong wind, needs to be the right speed. Look at the trees in this clip, they are barely moving, but one pole is shaking alarmingly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6xnuqE8q7k
I was thinking you probably don't need to get an exact match between the shedding frequency and the string frequency as the interactions between the string and air might self lock.
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According to the water analogy of electricity, transistor leakage is caused by holes.

Rixen

Quote from: EBK on July 29, 2019, 05:50:12 PM
Is this phenomenon at all related to the Takoma Narrows Bridge disaster?
Originally thought to be, but now attributed to aeroelastic fluttering

EBK

Quote from: Rixen on July 30, 2019, 06:19:15 PM
Quote from: EBK on July 29, 2019, 05:50:12 PM
Is this phenomenon at all related to the Takoma Narrows Bridge disaster?
Originally thought to be, but now attributed to aeroelastic fluttering
Oh, I remember now!
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