Jonathan gets this right. The same is true, by the way, for other things, e.g., I recall listening to opera singers from behind a few curtains - they were on stage and I was off but this works in both directions - and I thought they sounded very out of tune (but I knew they weren't).
The higher the frequency, the more directional it is - that's one of the reasons why, among other things, it's challenging to design a loudspeaker system with good "coverage" - high frequencies tend to "beam" or go out rather straight or in a narrow dispersal pattern from their source. This is one of those times when asking "why" serves very little purpose, IMHO, because truly understanding what's going on requires a fair amount of background in acoustics, more than any musician really needs, and it's really going to vary by physical circumstances of the house in which the performance is taking place. IMHO, the right solution is do what Hans says, play a bit sharp, ask someone in the house how it sounds, and that's that. -S- On Sun, May 29, 2011 at 5:34 PM, Jonathan West < [email protected]> wrote: > On 29 May 2011 21:19, <[email protected]> wrote: > > > > > Some things are counter intuitive but are true, despite our experiences. > > Einstein is a great example of someone who showed us that. > > > > > The actual physical pitch undoubtedly doesn't change. As has been correctly > pointed out, there is no doppler effect. So the appearance of being flat > must be an illusion. It is common knowledge that there are optical > illusions > but fewer people realise that there are auditory illusions as well. The > fact > is that our ears are not high-quality microphones attached to an expensive > Bang & Olufson stereo system. Our ears and brains can be fooled. > > There are two obvious ways in which sound characteristics of offstage brass > are different from onstage. One is that it is just softer, and the other is > that the higher harmonics carry less well the longer distances and through > such muffling items as curtains, and so there are fewer high harmoinics by > the time the sound reaches the audience. > > Quite why and by how much this makes the offstage music sound flat is more > to to with the way we process the sound in our ears and brains than with > the > characteristics of the sound itself. It may even be that not everybody > senses the offstage sound as being flat - or not to the same degree. I must > say that I'n not particularly noticed it, but that may be because offstage > players have deliberately played sharp. I don't know. > > Regards > Jonathan West > _______________________________________________ > post: [email protected] > unsubscribe or set options at > https://pegasus.memphis.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/options/horn/steve.freides%40gmail.com > _______________________________________________ post: [email protected] unsubscribe or set options at https://pegasus.memphis.edu/cgi-bin/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
