Music Department Research Seminar

Title:Acoustics applied to manufacturing processes and organology. The case of the piano
Date:16 September 2009 – 2:00 pm
Venue:Room MR11 – Second Floor, Wilson Building A, Open University
Speaker: Adrien Mamou-Mani (Newton Research Fellow, OU)

I will present two previous studies I carried out concerning the physics of the piano. The first one is a modelling of the “downbearing”, the downward load applied by the strings on the piano soundboard. Following the opinions of makers, its adjustment is crucial for the mechanical stability and the acoustical quality of the instrument. I will present some effects of this load on the vibration properties of the soundboards. An emphasis will be done on unusual values of downbearing, which induce very large amplitude vibration. The second study deals with the dynamical behaviour of a historical piano action. The organological question asked by the piano curator at the Musee de la musique in Paris was: Is the simple escapement action of Erard pianos different than the English grand piano action? I will propose an answer using both experiments with a high-speed camera and numerical models of one Erard action and one Broadwood action.