How to manipulate Overtones

A scientific guide to the sound phenomenon

The Henderson International School

Robert DeMangus, 6th Grade Science Report • Schau • March 2, 2006
Overtones
In order to explain my project, I must start at the fundamental cause of sound, indefinably,
vibration. Vibration is defined as mechanical oscillations about an equilibrium point (starting
point). These oscillations can be periodic such as the motion of a pendulum or random such as
the motion of a bouncing ball on a bumpy road. There are two main types of vibration. There are
free vibration and forced vibration. Free vibration occurs when something is set off by an initial
input and is allowed to vibrate freely. An example of this is hitting a bell and letting it ring or
holding a chain and letting it swing. Forced vibration occurs when an alternating force or motion
is applied to something. An example of this is a shaking washing machine due to imbalance or the
vibration of a building during an earthquake.

Often, vibration is undesirable. It wastes energy and creates unwanted sounds such as in mo-
tors and engines. These vibrations can cause imbalances in moving parts. Certain designs are
important to take into consideration and are sometimes necessary, in the making of vehicles, in-
struments, and various things because of this constant presence of sound. However, in recent
years scientists have been working with sound as a form of renewable energy. Sound has often
been forgotten and has been run over by hydro, wind, electric forms of energy. Now scientist are
working on perfecting types of power such as thermoacoustics. In many cases vibration is very
desirable. For example the motion of a tuning fork, the reed
on a woodwind instrument, or the cone on a loudspeaker
and is necessary for the correct functioning of various de-
vices. Where would we be without sound. Give me a time
during your day when you do not hear sound.

Vibrations oscillate at what we call a frequency. But in

order to understand them we must first understand the
fundamentals of vibration analysis. We will start with a
simple Mass-Spring-Damper model. Even a highly intricate
structure such as an automobile can be modeled as a
summation of a simple Mass-Spring-Damper model. A
Mass-Spring-Damper model is a model of a simple harmonic
oscillator as shown.
 To start the explanation of the Mass-Spring-Damper model we will assume the damping is not
a variable and that there is no external force applied to the mass.
This is an example of free vibration. The simple harmonic
oscillator above is an undamped spring-mass system (only in
oscillation).

The force applied to the mass by the spring is proportional to the amount the spring is
stretched = X. The proportionality constant =K, is the stiffness of the
spring and has units of force and distance. The mass obviously = M.
“Observed from an inertial reference frame, the net force on a particle of constant mass is
proportional to the time rate of change of its linear momentum” -Isaac Newton’s second law of
motion as stated by wikipedia.org/wiki/Newton’s_laws_of_motion.

This statement is often simplified as

If we assume that when we start a simple harmonic oscillator by stretching the spring by the
distance of A and letting go, the solution to that describes the motion of mass

This equation says that it will oscillate with simple harmonic motion that has an amplitude of A
and a frequency of fn. The number fn is one of the most important quantities in vibration analysis
and is undamped natural frequency. For the simple spring-mass-damper system fn is defined as
 This formula coverts vibration to a sound wave. A sound wave is at a certain frequency. Sound
is transmitted through gases, plasma, and liquids, as stated by
http://science.howstuffworks.com/humans-hear-in-space1.htm. Sound is defined those vibra-
tions composed of frequencies capable of being detected by an ear. Not just human ear, for a hu-
man can only hear frequencies from about 20 hz to 20,000 hz (20 khz). Dogs can hear frequen-
cies much higher than 20,000 hz. Sound is a signal that is perceived as one of the five senses
sound is used by many species to detect danger, find food, navigate, and most importantly com-
municate. Many species like ourselves have developed special organs to produce sounds which
have evolved to produce speech and song. Humans have even evolved to create technology and
culture such music, telephone, and radio.

Now that we know this I can explain what exactly an overtone is? An overtone is a natural
resonance of a system. What this means is that if a system, such as stringed or blown instrument,
is in use, a number of different frequencies may be produced along with the fundamental fre-
quency. In simple cases, like most musical instruments, the additional frequencies are the same
as harmonics. What are harmonics? A harmonic of a wave, in acoustics and telecommunication,
is a component frequency of the signal that is an integer multiple of the fundamental frequency.
This means if the fundamental frequency
is the note F, the harmonics have
frequencies F, 2F, 3F, 4F ... and so on. If
you measure it in hertz and the
fundamental frequency is 25 hz the
frequencies of the harmonic are going to
be 25hz, 50hz, 75hz, 100hz .... and so on.
The harmonics have the property that they
are all periodic at the fundamental
frequency, therefore the sum of harmonics
is also periodic at that frequency. Many
oscillators can be decomposed into
harmonics.

Most oscillators, from a guitar string to a bell, or even a hydrogen atom, will vibrate at a series
of distinct frequencies known as normal modes. The lowest normal mode frequency is the
fundamental frequency. The others are overtones. The untrained ear will not be able to hear
these overtones as separate notes. They will perceive them as the timbre of the instrument. The
timbre is what allows us for instance to distinguish a trumpet sound from a saxophone sound
even if they are playing the same exact note at the same loudness. Types of different timbre can
be described with words such as bright, dark, harsh, warm, and tinny. The timbre is created by
the certain overtones it emphasizes. This is determined by the position of sound nodes on an
instrument. Sound nodes are the spots on a sound wave or any wave in which there is no
oscillation. The anti-node is where there is the most oscillation as shown.

On a stringed instrument the nodes are the end of the string or were the string is stopped by a
bridge or a nut. The first overtone would be exactly twice the fundamental and would be created
by creating a node at exactly half the length of where the two fundamental nodes are. This will
create two anti-nodes instead of one. Creating a node is achieved by touching very lightly the
string at the place in which you wish to create a node. Similar rules apply in the length of wind
instruments. Wind musicians can achieve harmonic manipulation by a technique call
multi-phonics. In this technique a wind musician can play multiple notes at once. Singers can use
a psychoacoustic effect to create artificial overtones. These techniques are commonly used in
barbershop music where they often sing different tones that are the same notes as the naturally
occurring overtones. However our vocal cords use real overtones, too. We manipulate overtones
everyday without realizing it. Overtones allow use to differentiate vowels like a, e, i, o, u, even if
they are at the same pitch at the same loudness.

I plan on manipulating these overtones, not only scientifically, for that’s as easy as singing
your alphabet, but to manipulate them musically using my electric bass guitar. I plan on
recording my findings, make a chart of the fingerboard
and list harmonics I could achieve and maybe a chart of
the ones I couldn't. I plan on recording a song utilizing
overtones(if successful), write my conclusions and
discuss.

(Exert from “Portrait of Tracy” by Jaco Pastorius)

My hypothesis is that I believe I will be successful in

achieving and displaying overtones, however I do not know if I will be successful in performing a
song utilizing overtones. It requires precision and there is no room for errors in where you place
the nodes. There is also a chance that I might no be able to hear the harmonics due to the nature
of the instrument or the amplifier.

The materials I will use to perform my experiment will be using will be my electric bass, my
bass amplifier, my bass cable, and my musical ability.

In my experiment I began by setting up my bass and my amplifier. I then began lightly pressing
on where I wanted to create my sound node on the fret board of my instrument. I began with the
first fret then the second fret, and the third, and so on… I wrote down my results and made a
scale model of my fret board with results on the frets. I then had my scale model worked to
decode the sheet music of a song called “portrait of tracy” by Jaco Pastorius into harmonic
sequences. I then recorded myself demonstrating this song with harmonics.

I was successful with proving overtones scientifically and experimenting with them
musically, and recorded myself demonstrating it. I made an interesting discovery. My data results
show something I did not expect to find. It became obvious that when I tried to create a node on
the fifth fret (4th harmonic) when I was running off the neck pickup, a harmonic was not heard.
The neck pickup worked with every other harmonic. You could only hear the 4th harmonic from
the bridge pickup. I looked over all my variables and made an astonishing discovery. If you take
the length of the strings and divide by 4 it equals 8.5 inches. It turns out that the neck pickup is
exactly 8.5 inches from the bridge. The spot in which the 3rd of 4 sound nodes are created when
creating a node at the 5th fret. As you know the node is the spot of no vibration, therefore the
neck pickup was in-taking no vibration and would not create a sound. This could be a
breakthrough in electric stringed instrument technology. I have honestly never found a source or
person who could relate to these “dead zones” on a stringed instrument. If what I have found
stands true, I now wonder if you place a pickup at the anti-node you would get a different; and
possibly better or more efficient sound. Over the summer, I tried to prove this theory with acous-
tic stringed instruments. I discovered when a bowed instrument is bowed at the half way point(1st
harmonic) it emits no sound. this because I was trying to create a vibration at the node. When
this happens the two antinodes would both turn into nodes at the same time. this would tell that
there are three nodes and no antinodes. However this statement defies the laws of free vibration
because the initial input in being stopped by no outside force but does not vibrate freely. It has to
be that this is caused by imbalance with the opposite of itself. If we could use this imbalance in a
normal sound wave traveling through the air we could turn sound as we know it off and on at our
choosing. However, I can only cause this imbalance in physical objects acting as a wave. On the
contrary, many other things besides strings can act as waves. I recently found an article by Wayne
Hu and Martin White called “The Cosmic Symphony” stating that the cosmic microwave back-
ground radiation shows the early universe resounded with harmonious oscillations suggesting
that there was one base frequency set of by one initial input believed to be the big bang. If you
use Einstein's theory of “Timespace” stating that time and space are one put together in a con-
tinuum and you used this imbalance to stop the big bang acting like a wave by having another
outside force make the node in the 1st harmonic of the fundamental vibrate, you theoretically
stop time and space. I also came across a new radical theory called the String Theory. This theory
bridges the gag when describing gravity with elementary particles, and basically under the sec-
ond subatomic level is a string level in which vibrating string cause the existence of everything
through additional dimensions. If you manipulated the string through the additional dimensions
and stop the string and the energy in put you would stop the entire molecule at the lowest possi-
ble level. I plan to prove my imbalance by using a vibration wave motor to send electromagnetic
wave through a workable medium, the medium will act as the electromagnetic wave itself and
then i will be able to create the 1st overtone and somehow cause friction at the node if the elec-
tromagnetic wave still tries to travel but its stopped as long as he node is disturbed I have proved
my theory. In conclusion, I believe that overtones are a fact of nature that we can use to our ad-
vantage.