Pianos are percussion instruments according to the Hornbostel-Sachs system of categorizing musical instruments. It belongs to the percussion family because it produces sounds by striking the strings with a felt covered hammers. It is often miscategorized as a string instrument because it has strings. A pipe organ is the better choice for testing bass response. A Pipe organ which is a wind instrument, can produce very low notes, all the way down to 16 Hz, which is lower than what most full-range speakers can reproduce without a very good subwoofer.
Why not the piano as a reference for bass
I see a lot of commentary/reviews on a systems bass response that all seem to hinge on the 41 hz double bass and such range. At 27.5 the A0 note on a piano seems a better point to judge. Lots of piano in normal music vs say an organ note. I know when I feel that deep chord played it is one of things I enjoy about listening the most! Was listening to Wish you were here live and the piano was sublime.
So is it more of how much musical energy is perceived in the 40 hz range or what that makes this more of a reproduction benchmark?
I welcome your input!
New Joe Bonamassa out BTW!
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You are mistaken. The piano is classified as 314.122, considered a "cordophone" because they "produce their sounds by means of the vibration of a string or strings that are stretched between fixed points." More info here. Percussion instruments are classified idiophones. |
I was once tasked with designing a speaker system for amplifying electric piano. So I had to figure out how low in frequency the speaker system needed to go. Well it turns out that the fundamental of the 27.5 Hz low-A is down in level so much that it is of negligible audible significance. And, likewise its first overtone at 55 Hz! In fact a piano's lowest audibly significant frequency is the 62 Hz first overtone of low-B. So that was my target, and the customer liked the cab enough that he ordered a second one. Anyway, my point is, while piano DOES have very low frequency fundamentals, the energy of those fundamentals (and in some cases even their first overtone) is so low in level that, imo, piano is not really a suitable instrument for evaluating a speaker's bass response. Duke
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Yep, that bass is a plucked double bass but on the released track it was 'doubled' by a bass electric guitar, according to the clip. My point was that there is much more you can do with a double bass than just pluck it. With classical music you can go to concerts which are not subject to electronic manipulation so there is a real reference for judging reproduced sound quality. A bowed double bass will make all your drivers work hard, including the tweeters! |
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