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Comment by bbminner | Hacker News Reader

Is there a fundamental reason why a "perfect mechanism" like this sounds just like a "perfect string" = midi guitar instrument = harmonic sequence of a vibrating string? Does it mean that human fingers are responsible for the remaining harmonics that we associate with the "guitar sound" on top of the "theoretical guitar tembre".

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There is a lot of nuance that goes into how guitar is played which might not be obvious. Offsets for string timing, minor variations on fret-board pressure, pulling strings a bit either because of the way the chords work or for pitch reasons... it's just very complex.

Playing with a plectrum (or a thumb pick, or a bow) is very nuanced. I'm impressed that this mechanism works- it's a neat thing.

At the same time the mechanism of what fingers are doing when playing is very complex in ways that even good players and teachers might have a hard time enunciating. In addition having a good understanding of nuance in instrument, the nuances of performance, the nuances of the musical pieces, and being able to formulate what that is to a student is difficult and rare.

I'm not surprised that a smart and talented EE might not be able to know all that in addition to their more technical domain knowledge.

I've been learning guitar for a couple of years (being already an experienced pianist), and it was very surprising to me how many different techniques need to be mastered to play guitar. I never got to the level on piano where the precise way I hit the keys mattered (apart from soft or loud). On a guitar how precisely you hold and move your fingers makes a massive difference. Hammer-on, pull-off, bends, slides, barring and holding down multiple strings with one finger, are all different techniques. Then there's exactly where you hold the finger in relation to the fret which can really change the sound (or in my case, be completely wrong). On your right hand, there's how you pick or strum, even whether you use a plectrum, the pads of your fingers, or your nails.

Then there’s muting with the palm or fret hand to assist with arpeggios etc.

I usually tell friends with kids looking to get them into music; start your kids on piano. Stringed instruments like guitar or violin unfortunately introduce an additional aspect of difficulty that turns off a lot of young students who just want to start making music.

Indeed, wish I'd started with piano. It took so long before I could play anything I enjoyed on guitar, and that definitely had an impact on how long it took me to get good

i'm going through a similar learning experience: i've been playing the drums for nearly 3 decades and only now am i starting to learn jazz/swing and appreciate the extremely subtle dynamic variations that go into playing those rhythms (especially at lower volume). even something that seems as basic as switching to traditional grip can be a huge learning experience with a whole new set of small muscle groups to cultivate.

i think my guitar technique will always be pretty punk rock though :)

It sounds to me like the lack of timing variation and note dynamics make it sound robotic.

Added to this, I think the faster you go, the more it sounds like MIDI anyway. Here’s a human demonstrating that :

https://youtube.com/shorts/jMhRdSgXzNY?si=05oGl_ZgM9qnqxDG

https://youtu.be/D2r428egsvc?si=iXKWwC5FQDIobSUa

I'd guess that it's a combination of things:

- The material of the robot's "finger" makes for a very clanky sound (metal?). Actually it sounds kinda like a harpsichord - The perfect rhythm makes for a very robotic feel - The perfect consistency of how a string is plucked (same attack/volume at every note) also makes for a very robotic feel

The first is about harmonics, the second two not so much, but I'd expect that harmonics are the lesser of what makes it feel midi-ey. After all, some people play with metal picks or fingerpicks (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fingerpick).

Oh, it does sound exactly like a harpsichord, good point!

> Harpsichord: One of the main limitations of the harpsichord is its inability to vary the volume of sound produced. The dynamics are fixed; no matter how softly or forcefully a key is pressed, the volume remains the same

My take is: this is the reason why it sounds so much like a harpsichord.

guitarer here

tone

the

hands

Piano player here and feeling a bit bad for the engineer that the sound output of his 9400 hours of engineering effort is not distinguishable from a straight midi stream into the most basic guitar-string sample box from the 80's.

He essentially built a harpsichord, just without a keyboard. Not even sure whether it can slide (the vertically moving parts look like, but didn't find any so far in the examples).

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