I am an electrical engineer with a highly technical background, and I am also in the market for a new or used flute at the intermediate level ($1k range). As most of you are aware, there is a bewildering array of choices available, and an even bewildering-er array of opinions about those choices.
Everyone has his own two cents to put in about whether open or closed hole is better or whether Yamaha or Gemeinhardt is better. Some of those discussions degenerate into mudslinging and name calling and other flaming unpleasantry worthy of the most political discussion groups. When the matter is kept purely subjective in that way, there is no point in saying one is "better". What you mean is, you like one better.
Personally, I desire to play with a sound that I can only describe as a "chocolate" sound, because I do not have the vocabulary for describing sounds. I have read such descriptions of sounds as "dark", "brilliant", "shrill", etc., with never any explanation as to what that means acoustically.
OK. So the debate rages whether open or closed hole is better, but what I want to know is, are they DIFFERENT? Has anyone ever put two instruments, identical except for the open/closed thing, on a spectrum analyzer? What do the FT (Fourier Transform) of "dark" and "brilliant" sounds look like? Are those two mutually exclusive?
Do you know what I mean?
William |
