What You Will Achieve During This Task

You will undertake various experiments so that you can learn in a practical way how the basic families of musical instruments produce and alter pitches. You will also apply your experimental findings to answer questions about actual musical instruments. During the extension exercises you will investigate pitch from a mathematical perspective.

How To Complete This Task

Choose ONE of the following Activities. Gather all the materials needed. Construct your instrument(s) as described in the activity. Do the experiments and record your group's observations/findings from the discussion questions. Answer the Experiment Application Questions (individually or as a group) as thoroughly as possible. Your group may use any reliable sources of information, such as books or websites. All sources must be noted in your answers. You may wish to research and prepare all the answers before filling in the answers on this page. Email your answers to your teacher by clicking on the button at the bottom of the page.

How You Will Be Assessed On This Task

The emailed answers will be assessed for accuracy, thoroughness, grammar and spelling, layout, and the reliabilty of the sources used to prepare your group's answers. Your group can gain extra knowledge (and points) by also completing the optional "Extension" questions.

Details

Your class:

Your (or your group's) name:

Group members and their job titles (optional):

Teacher's email address that your answers will be sent to for marking:

Your email address that your teacher will email your marked answers back to:

When you (or your group) has finished, click the "Email your Pitch Task 1 answers to your teacher" button at the bottom of the page to send your answers to your teacher for marking.

Task Questions and Activities

Activities

• String Instruments Activity - This activity investigates pitch by looking at what affects the pitch of string instruments (such as violins and guitars).
• Wind Instruments Activity - This activity demonstrates how wind instruments (such as flutes and trumpets) produce notes of different pitches.
• Percussion Instruments Activity - This activity reveals how different materials and sizes affect pitch, particularly in percussion instruments (such as bells and xylophones).

String Instruments Activity

Materials and Preparation

• Lots and lots of rubber bands, as many different lengths and thicknesses and tightnesses as you can find.
• Either a small, sturdy cardboard box, small plastic box, OR a piece (about 20cm X 25cm or so) of thick, flat cardboard, OR a square or rectangular baking pan, one for each student or group.
• If you are using a box, then the rubber bands must be long enough to stretch around a box.
• If you are using flat cardboard, you will also need thumbtacks or pushpins.
• If you are using a box, then pencils, pens, or other objects of that size and shape (a couple for each instrument) will be useful.
• You may want scissors that are strong enough to cut the cardboard or plastic.

Procedure

1. Each student or group should choose a variety of rubber bands (3-6, depending on the size of your "instrument").
2. If you are using flat cardboard, stretch each rubber band between two thumbtacks so that it is tight enough to give a particular pitch - see figure 1.
3. If using a box or baking pan, stretch the rubber bands around the box or pan - see figure 1.
4. Pluck each rubber band separately and listen carefully to the "twang". Listen for which ones sound higher and which sound lower.
5. To try many different thicknesses and tightnesses, trade rubber bands with other groups.
6. If your group built the thumbtack instruments, you can vary the length and tightness of the rubber bands by changing the distance between the thumbtacks. Remember, though, that when you do this, you are changing both the length and the tightness, so it may be difficult to decide which variable has which effect. Experimentation is the way to see how changes affect the pitch.
7. With the box or pan instruments, you can vary tightness by pulling on the rubber band at the side of the box while plucking it at the top. You can vary length on the lidded box instrument by slipping a pencil under each end of the rubber bands on the top of the box and then varying the distance between the pencils, or even by holding the rubber band down tightly with a finger between the pencils, the same as a real string player does.

Discussion Questions

Wind Instruments Activity

Materials and Preparation

• Several narrow-necked bottles, all the same size and shape OR several narrow-necked bottles of varying sizes.
• If using bottles of the same size, you will also need water to fill them to varying depths.
• If using water, food coloring is very useful to clearly show the depth of the water.
• A recorder (any size).

Procedure

1. If using same-size bottles and water, put water in to a different depth in each bottle (for example, 5cm in one bottle, 10cm in another, 15cm in a third and so on - see figure 2). If you have food colouring, add a few drops to the water in each bottle so it is easy to see the depths.
2. Make the air in a bottle vibrate by blowing steadily across the top of the bottle.
3. "Play" each bottle in turn, and arrange them in order from the highest sound to the lowest.
4. Try to "tune" the bottles to form a scale by adding or pouring out water.
5. Why does covering and uncovering the holes on the recorder change the pitch?

Discussion Questions

Percussion Instruments Activity

Materials and Preparation

• A dowel, rod, or small beam, around 2m long, held at both ends about 1.8m off the ground.
• Lots of long, thin, objects of different sizes and materials (some suggestions: forks, spoons, spatulas, rulers, windchimes, lengths of chain, lengths of pipe or tubing).
• Enough string to hang the objects from the dowel.
• Tape if needed to keep the objects on the string.
• Something with which to strike the objects, such as a wooden spoon, short stick, pen or pencil, or ruler. Experiment with different "drumsticks".

Procedure

1. Hang the objects from the dowel with the string and tape.
2. Strike the objects one at a time.

Discussion Questions

Experiment Application Questions

a) Of the following instruments, which does not use tension to alter note pitches?

b) Of the following instruments, which can produce the lowest pitch?

c) Of the following instruments, which does not belong to the percussion family of instruments?