The talking machine world (Jan-Dec 1908)

4 THE TALKING ^lACfflNE WORLD. HORSE POWER OF MUSIC. Professor Webster of Worcester Tells American Academy How to Measure the Intensity of Tones and to Preserve Their Description for the Use of Future Scientists. A very interesting corner of physical science was considered at the last meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences by Prof. Arthur Gordon Webster, of Clark University, that of the "Pressure of Sound." "Sound," said the speaker, "consists in a rapidly varying pressure of air. If the tone "be a musical one, the variations are uniform, as for example in the middle C they are at the rate of 256 per second." It has been a work of investigation by Professor Webster during the past ten years to try to determine certain of the peculiarities of sound,' and in this work he has invented a number of pieces of apparatus. One of the most important of these is a device which for want of a better name he has called the "phone," which will produce always the same tone, and of a desired intensity. This in theory and in practice is a standard whereby the strength of other tones may be measured, and if one should desire in the future to know whether a tone is as loud then as it was to-day, it will be perfectly practicable to determine the fact. Such an instrument has many uses. In his various experiments irom year to year in which the .ear was concerned. Lord Kelvin was always questioning: "Can I hear as well to-day as yesterday?" The deaf are always desirous of getting a precise statement as to whether their hearing is improving or becoming poorer. Such an instrument will refer them to a standard, and give them a scientific statement for comparison. To-day they depend upon the guess of the aurist. It is evident at the outset in the matter of pressure, which is the one considered first by Dr. Webster, that if a measure could be taken of amount that the pressure is varied by the sound, facts with reference to the conditions existing would be made known. Accordingly physicists have been at work more or less upon the problem. But even with an intense sound the variation in pressure is exceedingly minute, and much more so in any sound that we are able to bear. One millionlh of an atmosphere variation in the air pressure would be a large amount to be due to sound, yet scientific men have set themselves to measure this infinitesimal variation. It will occur to any student that if the air is varying in pressure it might be measured by optical means, because denser air will have a different index of refraction from rarer air, and experiments along this line have been made by a German. There lies in the method, however, this diflSculty, that the air is affected to so slight a degree that a very loud noise must be made before the variations are visible. The efforts to solve the question have been taken, therefore, to the mechanical ground and experiments have been made with diaphragms. The phonograph is a machine that uses a diaphragm, but this while it produces a sound that the ear decides to be like the original, the result is from the scientific point of view very different, but the principle of the phonograph is a good one. So Professor Webster has been experimenting with diaphragms of different kinds. Membranes are sensitive to light pressures, but they are also affected by moisture, so that for the purposes of a standard they are useless. Metals have been tried, but they are affected by heat, and in these minute measurements they become also unreliable, so recourse has been had at last to glass. It has been found that thin glass, the cover glass for microscope slides, will be affected by the varying pressiire of the air produced by sounds, and so the later experiments have been made with this. Even then the movement is so slight (hat the microscope cannot read the displacements. Modern science affords much more delicate means that the microscope for the viewing of minute displacements, when these can be made In light, Mlchaelson's Interferometer being an instrument of this character, so Professor Webster's next move was to cement a Utile mirror to tills bit of cover-glass and by means of the in terference of light determine the motion of the glass. By this means a movement of less than a millionth of an inch is visible and measurable. Meanwhile the strength of the sound was increased by the use of a resonator, which might make it even as much as forty times more intense. One of the devices employed by this ingenious scientist was to measure the vibrations of the plate by a telescope that was itself set on a tuning-fork which gave it an opposing motion so that it nullified in part the rapid vibrations of the glass plate. Meanwhile a German investigator. Max Wien, of Dantzig, a college mate of Webster's, in Europe, had been at work on the same problem. Wien mounted on the glass plate a little mirror set on a bit of watch spring, and put the whole within a second resonator, thus by the magnification of two resonators and the spring of the steel the motion was brought within the reach of the microscope. In the statement of his results. Professor Webster made use of many of those graphic curves with which mathematicians delight to set forth their work. Some of the ideas, however, may be expressed popularly, and some of the results show the enormous waste of energy that our ordinary mechanical methods entail. The "phone" with which he is experimenting can be heard for half a mile in the open air, yet it takes no power to run it, an infinitesimal current merely. The output of the ordinary cornet (at the bell) is not more than a millionth of a horse-power, so that all but the merest fraction of power that the player puts into his mouthpiece is thrown away. The organ pipe is a very wasteful device, for most of the motive power is thrown away and but a fraction of the wind from the bellows Is really utilized in making music. The power expended in noise is very great in places, on the coast of Maine there is a fog whistle that takes 60 horse-power, while in England there is one consuming about 600 horse-power. In these not more than a tenth of one per cent, is really used to make the signal. The outcome of the investigations is that scientists can now measure sound without using the human ear, and that they can express the energy and activity in units. One sound may be compared with another, sounds may be compared at different times with other sounds even in different places, and it is now possible to, so to speak, pack away the sounds of to-day so that the scientists of the future can compare them. HERR DIPPEL'S DRASTIC RULING. Will Not Allow Grand Opera Artists at the Metropolitan to Sing for Talking Machine Companies During Time of Engagement. The recent decree of Herr Dippel, new conductor of the Metropolitan Opera Co., is that no artists under contract to sing at the Metropolitan may sing for the talking machine companies during the time of their engagement, though they are at liberty to sing for such companies either before or after the opera season. He says that last year certain singers who would never have consented to sing two days in succession at the opera house were known to have spent hours singing for the machines on the same days they sang in the opera house at night. The most popular singers earn large sums by singing for talking machine companies, and several of them are kept under a large retainer from year to year. As the sale of their records is largely affected by the degree of fidelity with which they reproduce the original voice, the singers are very anxious to make them as nearly perfect as possible and work at them until the best results are attained. Some of the singers count on $25,000 or more in royalties every year from the sale of their records. As the Victor Co. already have numerous selections by the leading opera stars affected by the decree including Caruso, Scotti, Farrar, Sembrich and Eames, they will not be greatly inconvenienced by the new order coming at this time. They can make all the records required before or after the season at the Metropolitan. The Columbia Phonograph Co.'s list of grand opera records are offered by arrangement with the Fonotipia Co., Who do all their recording in Europe and do not require the services of the artists until the return to Europe after their Metropolitan season. NEW DEFINITION OF "DVnVIORTALITY.^ It has been stated in publications devoted to the interests of ri^■al political parties that the talking machine record entitled "Immortality," made by William Jennings Bryan, was chosen with a view to keeping clearly before the people the undying candidacy propensities of the Democratic champion. An ad. that doesn't tell the truth is a good deal like a glass of water colored to look like wine. The drinker isn't liable to come back for more after the first swallow. The Cleveland Phonograph Co., Cleveland, O., have incorporated with a capital stock of $300,000. Incorporators, E. C. Beach, F. W. Treadway, William H. Marlatt, Charles J. Ford and Albert L. Austin. 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