Measurements on the effect of vertical plucking angle of the kantele string

Abstract

When a string instrument is plucked by hand, the player has the control over the plucking angle and the plucking position to influence the timbre. Different plucking angles will excite the vibrational modes of the strings differently. We designed a measurement rig to vary the vertical plucking angle in a controlled manner. We measured four different plucking angles at three different plucking positions with the copper wire excitation method on the Finnish eleven-string kantele. The results show that the beating phenomenon of the string partials depends on the plucking angle. The results can be used for example for sound synthesis purposes.