Enrichment of Student Understanding of Acoustics through the Modernization of a Physics of Music Laboratory

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Physics of Music is a course especially designed for music, music education, and music theater majors, as part of their general education in science. This project adapts current sound experiments to include elements of physics of music courses from other institutions, implementing these ideas through the use of modern instrumentation. Students use computers in the visualization and analysis of sounds emphasizing quantitative measurement of the quality or timbre of musical sounds. These experiments enable students to learn "what makes different musical instruments sound differently". The key to understanding this is to advance student understanding of overtones and harmonic spectra. New experiments are developed to promote the students' critical thinking, problem-solving abilities and creativity by studying and measuring harmonic spectra of musical sounds from a variety of musical instruments. The experiments use computers as spectrum analyzers for real-time analysis of sounds from various musical instruments and the human voice. In addition, resonance and the spatial distribution of loudness around musical instruments is studied while they are being played. Using this equipment, a stand-alone Physics of Sound module is developed as part of our new integrated science course of student learning for other majors especially liberal arts majors and teachers. Details of these experiments are available in a course laboratory manual, disseminated at professional meetings, and accessible on the web. A clearing-house website on Physics of Music courses and laboratories is made available through this project.