Plucking Location and Timbre of a Guitar

Abstract

A guitar string was plucked at 21 positions spanning the whole string with a consistent plucking method. The sound produced by the pluck was recorded and analyzed under a frequency-amplitude graph. It was shown that the amplitude of a harmonic tone at a point corresponded to the amplitude of the standing wave of the harmonic at the same point. Plucking a string at particular positions is an effective way of influencing the timbre of a guitar to one’s preference.

Keywords

• guitar
• amplitude
• harmonic
• timbre
• standing wave
• plucking