Author: TheSoundBlog

  • Big Ben's Bongs

    Big Ben's Bongs

    The science behind one of UK’s most iconic sounds A signature sound for Great Britain is the bongs of Big Ben, the giant bell housed within the clock tower of the Houses of Parliament. And tonight it will welcome in the New Year. There is something special about the sound. Listen to a bell chime…

  • Did Grover drop the F-bomb?

    Did Grover drop the F-bomb?

    Yanny or Laurel 2.0? Did Grover really say the F-word. It is all about the science of suggestion.

  • Beatboxers: Playing on the Listener's Brain

    Beatboxers: Playing on the Listener's Brain

    How listener’s hear beatboxing, and how the performer exploits an auditory illusion in performance.

  • Acoustics Advent Week 3+

    Acoustics Advent Week 3+

    A summary of the Acoustics Advent for days 15 to 25. Enjoy.

  • Why do we dislike hearing a recording of our own voice?

    Why do we dislike hearing a recording of our own voice?

    Why do people not like the sound of their own voice?

  • #AcousticsAdvent Week2

    #AcousticsAdvent Week2

    Day 8 Can you recognise this reversed Christmas hit? You have 5 seconds before the answer reveals. Hopefully you didn’t hear anything Satanic (backmasking)! This sort of reverse test has been tried on animals to see what parts of calls are important. if you play a reversed bird song and you still get a reply,…

  • #AcousticsAdvent Week1

    Day 1 Father Christmas tests his #HoHoHo in the oil tank with the World record reverb. After warming up in Salford’s anechoic chamber. More on the World record tank or Chapter 1 of Sonic Wonderland/The Sound Book. More on how Santa’s voice get teleported to the Inchindown Oil Tank with the World Record reverb. Day 2…

  • How I added a Halloween feel to Merry Christmas Everyone

    A few year’s ago I presented a programme for BBC Radio 4 where I learnt how to make music that has unresolved dissonance. For #AcousticsAdvent I decided to do a new version of a Christmas classic – see SoundCloud below. The effect kicks in half way through. Below I describe why researchers were doing this, and…

  • How Santa tested the acoustics in the Inchindown Oil Depot

    To make the video “Santa does Architectural Acoustics” I used a process called auralisation to virtually place him into the oil tank that has the World record reverberation time. As you can see from the photo below, he would have been too plump to fit down the access pipes, which are behind him. Auralisation is…

  • The lowering of the Queen's voice

    The Queen’s Christmas message from 2017 has a nice juxtaposition of her current voice and how she sounded 60 years earlier (about 45 seconds into the video below). How has her voice changed? And why have women’s voice pitch dropped in recent decades? The first thing I take from hearing the two Christmas messages is…