Re: IMO - Why red spruce is the loudest top wood
I'm neither a physicist nor a long-time mandolinist; just an average guy who is learning his way around a new (to me) instrument. But I have been a musician going on 50 years and I like to think I have what my grandma used to call "a grain of common sense."
In essence we're talking about taking a piece of what was once a living organism, crafting it by the hand of another living organism, using primarily techniques derived by years of trial-and-error, and evaluating the results by the most subjective means possible; i.e., aesthetics. Then we're trying to compare that subjective evaluation to other subjective evaluations made by other people, of other instruments crafted by individual craftsmen from other pieces of once-living organisms, and trying to draw some type of general conclusions as to what makes one instrument sound like/different from another one.
All that to say that while scientific inquiry is a good thing even in music, and anything which advances the art and science of lutherie is a good thing, trying to definitively answer some of the questions surrounding musical instruments is probably like trying to understand why your Uncle Ned fell in love with your Aunt Bessie and calls her "Beautiful" when the rest of the family all agree that her face could stop a clock and her singing has been known to attract loved-starved bull moose.
-- Johnson MA-100 Mando
-- Eastman MDO-305 OM
-- 3 Seagull Merlin dulcimers (2GDG, 1DAD)
-- 1952 Harmony Roy Smeck guitar
-- Ortega Lizzie Ubass
-- Leigh Campbell electric violin
-- Pfretzschner violin
-- Glaesel viola
-- Ibanez acoustic/electric guitar
-- Misc: a cello, 2 cigarbox guitars, charango, djembe, slide dulcimer.
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