Silence of the violins
Physics World · 1999
Violinists are always taught to bow close to the bridge of the instrument but they might be surprised to learn that violins and other stringed instruments produce no sound at all when bowed at the midpoint of the string. This intriguing result emerged from experiments on various instruments by Johann Broomfield, a physics student and an experienced viola player, and Michael Leask at the University of Oxford. The finding seems counter-intuitive: a plucked string reaches its maximum acoustic amplitude at its midpoint, suggesting that it should be easiest to excite a sound at this point. It is also surprising that neither musicians or physicists have noticed the effect before (J E Broomfield and M J M Leask 1999 Eur. J. Phys. 20 L3).