Sound Quality: Definition, Differentiation & Noise
Basically, large amplitudes produce loud sounds. For example, a shout would produce a sound wave with a larger amplitude than a whisper. Another characteristic of sound that your brain recognizes is pitch. Pitch deals with the frequency of sound wave vibrations.
Sound is expressed with different measures of pitch, loudness, and other qualities to compose the timbre, which is the overall quality of the sound. See how different sounds are differentiated by examining noise, loudness, pitch, and overtones.
Timbre
When you go to a concert, your ear can pick out different sounds. You might hear notes being simultaneously played by a piano, guitar, and violin. Each of these instruments will sound different to you, even if they have the same pitch and loudness. So, how does your brain distinguish between different sounds? The answer has to do with the timbre, or the quality of the sound. Timbre is a general term used to distinguish one sound from another. In this lesson, we will learn about sound quality and how you use it to differentiate sounds and noises.
Regardless of whether you are talking about the pleasing sounds coming from a concert band, or the annoying sounds being generated by the person sitting next to you, we can think of sounds as a mixture of sound waves occurring at different frequencies.
As sound waves travel toward your ear, they alternately compress and expand the air. This movement of the air causes your eardrum to vibrate. The eardrum transfers this vibration to the small bones of the ear, turning the vibrations into nerve signals. From that point, your brain takes over interpreting the sound as pleasant music or annoying noise. So, we see that noise is largely a subjective phenomenon, which is really just something your brain considers to be undesirable sound. For example, a little girl playing a violin for the first time might sound like noise to you, but to her proud parents, it might sound like beautiful music.
Carlos Alves de Sousa
