Listeners lose the ability to identify instruments once onset and offset phases are removed.

Evidence

A number of psychoacoustic experiments have been carried out to explore listeners’ perceptions of the timbre of musical instruments and the acoustic factors on which it depends. Such experiments have demonstrated, for example, that listeners cannot reliably identify musical instruments if the onset and offset phases of notes are removed. For example, if recordings of a note played on a violin open string and the same note played on a trumpet are modified to remove their onset and offset phases in each case, it becomes very difficult to tell them apart. — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 1470

Categorization

• QUESTION: How much of ‘timbre’ is really just transient onset information rather than sustained spectral content — and what does that mean for steady-state listening?
• XREF: Connects to psychoacoustics and listening-practice work: the ear keys on attack transients, which is why deep listening to a sustained tone misses much of what identifies a source. — connects to: Melodic interval identification degrades once about 9-10 harmonics are removed — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1289; Experienced listeners preserve octave judgment precision at 5 kHz where phase locking degrades.; Audiophile hardware that omits tone controls harms listeners’ ability to improve sound. — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 928 (+17 more)

Broader Connections

• Listeners perceive missing fundamentals from the harmonics that remain #complicates (0.97) — Professor Dr.-Ing. Hugo Fastl, Professor Dr.-Ing. Eberhard, Psychoacoustics- Facts and Models, 3278
• What a listener hears differs from an instrument’s raw output #qualifies (0.93) — David Howard, Jamie Angus, coustics and Psychoacoustics, 1082
• Melodic interval identification degrades once about 9-10 harmonics are removed #complicates (0.91) — Jennifer Lentz, Psychoacoustics- Perception of Normal…, 1289
• Experienced listeners preserve octave judgment precision at 5 kHz where phase locking degrades. #complicates (0.91)
• Listeners hear tones that are absent from the presented sound #complicates (0.90) — Eric J. Heller, Why You Hear What You Hear- An…, 2275
• Room reverberation erases the audibility of phase changes in signals. #complicates (0.90)
• Off-center listeners lose the stereo illusion but retain musical content #complicates (0.88) — Toole, Floyd E, Sound reproduction- the acoustics and…, 395
• Phase shifts between the ears can substitute for onset time delays in detecting sounds. #qualifies (0.88) — Professor Dr.-Ing. Hugo Fastl, Professor Dr.-Ing. Eberhard, Psychoacoustics- Facts and Models, 1625
• Difficult change-detection tasks exclude some normal-hearing listeners entirely #complicates (0.87) — Dijk, Pim van, Physiology, Psychoacoustics and…, 3291
• Sound must vary over time to hold listener attention #complicates (0.86) — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 1486
• Binaural realism degrades when the listener’s head differs from the recording head. #complicates (0.84) — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 2248
• Listeners detect deviant tone patterns worse when pattern intervals vary more #complicates (0.83)
• Decorrelators degrade audio quality on transient-rich signals like applause. #complicates (0.83) — Ville Pulkki, Matti Karjalainen, Communication Acoustics- An…, 2151
• Instrument frequency ranges leave room for inaudible filtering #qualifies (0.81)
• A fixed musical interval’s dissonance varies with register, worsening as notes lower #complicates (0.79) — David M. Howard, Jamie Angus, Acoustics and Psychoacoustics, 1008