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myth-busting: Resonance is not synonymous with Vibration

#81
chadds said:
It's a belief that it doesn't matter. I accept that. I live my life with science and experience.
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Me too. That's why I say it doesn't matter as I've looked at the physics as well as practical examples.

In 1970 I sat in a room with a Gibson ES an SG and a Les Paul all about 1965 vintage. Same amp same player. Why don't they sound the same? There is a never an answer. [/quote]

Were the pickups also swapped.

Put Stat pickups on a Tele. Does is sound like a Strat?
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I've done this. Yes, it does. Neck pickup anyway - the only one I tested.

Does a Strat with humbuckings sound like a Les Paul?
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Are they the same specifications in the same locations?

Even if I have three identical basses why do they sound different?
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I have two bases of the same model, same year. They sound the same (modern pickup construction, less variation). This is good, and is what I wanted. I didn't try them beforehand and select them because they sounded the same, but expected them to sound the same, and they do.
 
#82
Why is resonance in an acoustic instrument good, but in an electric instrument it's bad? Most of the character from an electric instrument comes from the pickups and strings, but body, neck and fingerboard woods will have some impact on the tone and response of the instrument. It could provide warmth or brightness, absorb or not absorb frequencies that can provide a tone that is perceived as punchier or softer to the ear. We usually like those oddities, without them we say that an instrument sounds sterile. Take graphite necks as an example.
 
#88
Polkatronixx said:
doesn't everything resonate? I thought pretty much everything resonates at some frequency or other.
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Everything is Vibrating, but they are not necessarily vibrating at their resonant frequency.
Resonance & Vibration are not the same thing, I'm not sure why it has become synonymous in 'slang' or colloquial speaking, but it has.

Another one like that which comes to mind is jealous. People throw 'jealous' around when they mean 'envious' so often that the dictionaries were actually changed.
Tone is the one that replaced Timbre
Originally, tone is a component of the timbre.
 
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#89
Killed_by_Death said:
Everything is Vibrating, but they are not necessarily vibrating at their resonant frequency.
Resonance & Vibration are not the same thing, I'm not sure why it has become synonymous in 'slang' or colloquial speaking, but it has.

Another one like that which comes to mind is jealous. People throw 'jealous' around when they mean 'envious' so often that the dictionaries were actually changed.
Tone is the one that replaced Timbre
Originally, tone is a component of the timbre.
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Okay. I guess my point was that any object will resonate.

After posting my comment, I thought about it and realised you were saying that a bass that is 'less resonant' is better - basically, that a bass that ideally won't resonate when you play any of the notes it can play.

I was stuck on the idea that everything can resonate and was assuming it isn't possible for something to not resonate - but realised that if the resonant frequency for a bass was a frequency not likely to be created by playing the bass, it would be less resonant or whatever.
 
#92
mambo4 said:
It's not myth to bust
but a colloquial vs scientific definition conflict for "resonance"
the definition being used needs to be agreed upon by all parties
before one can make a valid true/false claim to another
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That's actually a good point. The purpose of language is to communicate - if people are talking about a topic and understand the terms they are using in a certain way (and have a shared, agreed understanding), it's perfectly fine.

One of my pet hates is when people claim to be "grammar police" or whatever and don't know the difference between spelling and grammar. That irritates me - but if a person typing "there" instead of "their" is commonly believed to be making a grammar mistake and everyone believes that, then why do I need to be so pedantic?
 
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#94
James Collins said:
If you want a guitar with a solid body guitar with a lively acoustic sound you might be best off with one that is the stiffest you can get, which would probably make plywood the best tonewood. :)
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Wood is much stiffer is you try to bend the grain than if you try to bend it at a right angle to the grain - the fibers are what makes it stiff. Plywood takes some of the fibers and turns them 90 degrees. The resulting piece isn't as stiff as the original wood in the direction of the grain, but it is stiffer than the original wood across the grain. Plywood also adds glue, which adds damping - it's not as resonant as regular wood.
 
#97
Killed_by_Death said:
Physics is inherently pedantic by nature.
You can't leave off the unit of measure in an experiment like the folks leave off Ohms when commenting about potentiometer values.
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Right, but when talking about a non-uniform substrate like the laminated, bonded, and/or bolted woods, metals, and plastics that go into a guitar, resonance becomes a much more complicated discussion than "resonance is bad". As an analogy, I find it helpful to think of a solid body guitar as an organic first-stage EQ that filters out certain frequencies (and accentuates others) in order to give the instrument a characteristic "voice". Does this make it bad? Not at all - it's a feature of the instrument. Does this mean you'll like it? No - everybody has their own preferences.

Is resonance a duck or a rabbit? Neither and both.

duck-rabbit.png
 
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