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Quality indicators for woodwind reed material

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Author

Summary, in English

For the generation of sound, some woodwind musical instruments, e.g. oboe, bassoon, clarinet and saxophone, are provided with mouthpieces made from reeds. These reeds are the culms of Arundo donax, a tall, cane-like perennial grass. A general problem is that the material is of varying quality, yet externally differences cannot be observed. Hence, large proportions of the prepared reeds are unusable. One hypothesis is that the changes in quality are correlated with differences in the chemical and anatomical structure of the tissue. Therefore, a comparison of superior and inferior mouthpieces, used by professional musicians, was undertaken to determinate potential indicators of quality. Nuclear microprobe analysis of reeds was carried out and complemented by scanning electron and light microscopy. The elemental levels of Si, P, S, Cl, K and Ca were compared between good and poor mouthpieces using appropriate statistical tests. No statistically significant differences could be identified. Microscopical observations showed that partial occlusion of vessels by tylose formation was associated with material deemed unusable.

Publishing year

1999

Language

English

Pages

673-678

Publication/Series

Nuclear Instruments & Methods in Physics Research. Section B: Beam Interactions with Materials and Atoms

Volume

150

Issue

1-4

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Elsevier

Topic

  • Subatomic Physics
  • Biological Sciences
  • Zoology

Status

Published

Research group

  • Nuclear Microprobe

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 0168-583X