Text: [Physics] Used in reference to sounds (vibrations) produced by responsive vibrations induced in one body by transmission of vibrations from another. Sounds are "communicated" when they are merely conveyed from one sounding body to another, and this can take place in a noise as well as a musical sound. Sounds are "excited" under two circumstances: when a body which is sounding and that to be excited have the same note and the vibration of one produces sympathetic vibration of the other, the bodies are mutually called "reciprocating", while of the vibration of one produces its harmonics in the other, the latter is said, with regard to the exciting body, to be "resonant". According to Helmholtz, "timbre" or "quality" depends on definite combinations or certain secondary sounds or harmonics with a primary or fundamental sound, and such combinations he calls "sound colours". A Dictionary of Musical Terms; Novello, Ewer and Co., London, pre-1900

See Also: EAR; SOUND COLORS

Source: 125