The Physics of Acoustic Guitar - 800 Words

The Physics of Acoustic Guitar Everything in the universe involves some type of physics. Even the universe itself does, but have you ever wondered about the physics of simpler items? Physics is vital for all musical instruments, if it wasn’t; they probably wouldn’t produce the beautiful sounds that they do. One of these instruments is acoustic guitar. By looking at the instrument, it doesn’t look very complicated, but if you delve deeper into its composition, you’ll find that it’s very complicated. Physics takes part in the making of acoustic guitars, all the way to how it produces its beautiful music. Before you can understand the physics of playing the guitar, you must first know the brief history of it. The guitars’ history can be†¦show more content†¦The strings can be made nylon or steel, nickel, and bronze. What particular kind of string one uses usually depends on the type of chords that are being played. When the strings are plucked and played, the air around them vibrates, hence creating a sound wave. The mass, length, and tension of the strings are what creates the frequency in which the guitar makes. The tuners at the head of the guitar can change the tension of the strings, this in turn, changes the frequency, which is the rate at which the vibration occurs. For example, if the strings are heavier they will vibrate slower and the pitch will be lower. The pitch will be higher if the tension of the strings is tighter. The frequency also depends on the length of the string that is free to vibrate. When playing, you can change this by holding the string firmly against the fret board with a finger (Wolfe). The strings themselves hardly make any noise when plucked. They disrupt very little air since they make less contact with the other air molecules. However, if the string is attached to a large object, more air is disturbed. In this case, the string forces the larger object to begin vibrating at the sam e frequency as the string. Now that a larger area is disturbed, this means that more air molecules are being vibrated. When all the molecules are vibrating at the certain frequency of the string, then the sound is produced. The frequency at which theseShow MoreRelated Physics of an Acoustic Guitar Essay1756 Words   |  8 PagesPhysics of an Acoustic Guitar I have been watching my husband play the guitar in a band for five years and he has made it look so easy to make such beautiful music. Most guitar players have progressed with the technology of electric guitars, but when my husband picks up an acoustic guitar and starts to play a song for just me, I hear his love for me in the sounds that he produces. 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