Perception of longitudinal components in piano string vibrations

Abstract

This paper investigates the audibility of longitudinal components in piano string vibrations with listening tests. The recorded fortissimo sounds of two grand and one upright pianos have been resynthesized with and without longitudinal components and used in ABX type listening tests. Results suggest that the longitudinal components are audible up to note C5. However, a second test seeking the importance of the difference shows that the effect of longitudinal components for the range A3−C5 is subtle. This means that modeling the phenomenon up to around note A3 only is acceptable for sound synthesis applications.