Horns, Strings and Harmony

"A fascinating excursion into an area too often ignored by the musical practitioner." — Music Library Association Notes.

If you've ever wondered how a musical instrument produces the sound it does, this book explains the physics of musical instruments in an engaging and understandable way. Dr. Benade was a nuclear physicist, flutist, and science educator with a special ability to explain complex ideas in a simple, straightforward manner. In this book he brings that ability to bear in elucidating the ways in which music is formed by many different kinds of musical instruments. Dr. Benade first explores simple and complex vibrating systems and the ear's reception of sound. He then describes the fundamentals of the piano, violin, trumpet, bugle, trombone, oboe, clarinet, flute, saxophone, and many other instruments, demonstrating the sound-making capacities of each. For mechanically inclined readers who are interested in constructing basic instrumental models, Dr. Benade demonstrates how to build a working trumpet, flute, and clarinet.

Enhanced with clear diagrams and easy scientific models, Horns, Strings, and Harmony is a book that will increase the musical enjoyment and understanding of all musicians, music lovers, and amateur scientists.

"The book is commended not only to the 'young person' who seeks to know some physics of musical instruments but also to those who would like to review in simple outline the basic physics of what happens within a musical instrument." — Journal of the Acoustical Society of America.