With that description out of the way, I looked through all of the data and decided that I would show a picture of what the High C (from BB#11) looked like. This considers a picture of the note at the “close mic” and the “far mic” for me and Benny.
Click here to listen to Derek playing High C (close microphone) 
Click here to listen to Derek playing High C (far microphone) 
Benny playing High C (close microphone): 
Benny playing High C (far microphone): 
While those pictures are very interesting (especially if you’ve had a chance to play with the Audacity program), a little analysis is in order to really understand what you’re seeing. Once I had the Frequency Analysis, I exported the data to a text file. This included the frequencies with the corresponding dB values. I quickly discovered that the frequencies were always the same in the text files, so I had to pick out the frequency of the fundamental pitch (like A440 Hz), and the figure out what each of the overtone frequencies were for the notes. You will understand this when you look at the next picture:
You’ll notice right away that I was playing my C at 931 Hz and Benny was at 941 Hz. 931 Hz was not a value that was specifically called out in the exported text file, so I just pulled in the frequencies that were closest to 931 and 941 Hz. I show the Decibel levels at the close mic and the far mic for both me and Benny. My fundamental was quite a bit louder than Benny’s (we didn’t have a way to standardize our dynamic – which didn’t really matter). You will notice that I was a little louder at the close mic but quite a bit louder at the far mic. In the Freq Diff (Frequency Difference) column, I show Benny’s sound magnitude minus my sound magnitude. This simple means that when there is a minus in the Freq Diff column I was louder than Benny. When the value in this column is positive, he was louder than me.
To make it very simple, I color-coded the results. When you see BLUE, I was louder for that specific frequency range and when you see YELLOW Benny was louder. It is very clear from this analysis that Benny is ringing all of the overtones above the High C
MUCH stronger than I am. Does this surprise anyone?
Even though I don’t show the individual Frequency Analysis snapshots (you wouldn’t believe how long it takes to compile all of this data!!!!), I want to show the spreadsheet analysis that I did for several other notes for comparison:
I pride myself for my sound, and I’ve worked very hard to cultivate a vibrant sound model in my daily practice sessions. This snapshot shows that compared with a fantastic symphony player, I occasionally can get a note off that is REALLY GOOD. If we had a college or high school player in the mix for comparison, I think the difference in vibrant, resonant tone quality would be MUCH more apparent.
I’m still amazed that a note which can sound as loud at my ears or louder than another player with great carrying power (as confirmed by the microphone) but fail to get out to the hall. I’ve known this now for quite a few years, and this experiment simply verifies my sound impression from behind the bell.