Structural Physical Characteristics of Sound Spectra from Wind Instruments

The physical characteristics obtained by SCHUMANN in the partial tone structure of sound from wind instruments are shown in new and original research work. They hold for wood and brass instruments. By means of average value envelopes, which represent a superposition of all spectra of an instrument of a calculated loudness, from formant-centres of the strongest amplitude partial tones and from simple spectral envelopes, the spectral analyses of different workers may be compared. Thus Schumann's tone-colour laws become clearer: the existence of the fixed formant regions, the displacement law the jump law and the formant-interval law.

Structural physical laws do physically exist according to Schumann and their significance for the qualitative judgement of instrumental sound must be made clear by research into hearing which he has started. Above all else the permissible scatter values of the inner spectral structures can give information about the qualitative nature of different hearing impressions.