Singing Bowl Education
This one singing bowl, when I use these different inviters and strikers, actually performs as if it is six different singing bowls.
I measured this bowl, and what I mean by this particular singing bowl, I mean this exact singing bowl, with a series of strikers. What I wanted to do is not just understand this bowl in general. I wanted to understand how this singing bowl sounds different, creates different timbres, creates different range, and behaves differently under the different conditions of the different mallets, inviters, and strikers we apply to it.
A singing bowl has a possible spectrum of total dynamic tonality based on that individual bowl's construction: its materials, mass, weight, and diameter. For this bowl, that means one fundamental tone, the lowest prominent audible tone, and then a stack of partials, or overtones, on top of it.
There is no tuning in the same way that you tune a guitar or a piano. I cannot take this bowl from 270 hertz and make it 265 hertz after the fact. So when we talk about tuning with a bell metal bronze singing bowl, we are talking about a measurement after the fact of the acoustic characteristics of that particular bowl.
Each striker, due to its weight, its material, its hardness and mass, brings out, highlights, or removes various of the overtones and fundamentals. The strikers are not changing the way this singing bowl behaves. They are revealing particular characteristics of this singing bowl in really nuanced ways.
There is no single best option for anything here. All of this is a conversation about what characteristics you want to bring out of a particular bowl, and then choosing the mallet or striker that highlights the characteristics you would prefer to focus on in a particular playing.
Here is something characteristic of the majority of very well-crafted bronze singing bowls: each tone is actually a doublet. The fundamental note of this bowl is not just one frequency. It is split between about 113.7 Hz and 114.3 Hz.
The way a singing bowl works is that it vibrates in modal vibrations. When I excite the bowl and put vibration into it, it squishes in and squishes out. Because these bowls are handmade, they are slightly asymmetrical. They are not perfect. So when it squishes in on one axis, it vibrates at 113.7 Hz. When it squishes in on the other, it vibrates at 114.3 Hz. Two frequencies, beating against one another.
The character of that beat frequency is the wah, wah, wah you experience when you listen to a bowl like this. The bowl modulates because the squishing in and squishing out is creating these doublets. And every partial stacked on top of the fundamental behaves the same way.
Measured spectrum · one bowl · frequency in Hz, low to high
Each paired mark is one doublet: two close frequencies beating against each other. That is the total available dynamic range of this bowl.
These strikers and inviters are not changing the way that this singing bowl behaves, but they are revealing particular characteristics of this singing bowl in really nuanced ways. Each of these, due to its weight, due to the material, due to its hardness or mass, reveals a particular characteristic of this singing bowl.
How to read the charts below: the gray outlines are the bowl's full spectrum, identical in every chart. The black fill shows how much of each layer that striker makes audible.
Dragonfly Percussion · foam core · soft exterior
This mallet is nearly perfect at bringing out the fundamental and the third partial. It focuses in almost exactly on that 113 Hz layer, and at the same time on the third partial around 343 Hz. Almost none of the other overtones are prominently present.
To put it simply, this focuses the bowl on revealing the low end and the deeper tones, and it does almost none of the revealing of the higher, shimmery overtones on top.
The "clown nose" mallet · included with every large format bowl for 10 years
Similar territory, but reversed. With this one, the third partial becomes dominant. When I strike the bowl with this mallet, the 338 Hz layer is the most audible tone, and right beneath it I audibly hear the fundamental.
It also reveals a little more of the other overtones. There is some presence of the 238 Hz and 660 Hz partials, but not much. In the measurement, they sit about 30 decibels below the two dominant layers. They are way down there, subsurface.
Carbon fiber handle · lightweight · soft surface · born in professional percussion
This one creates the perception of a really, really bright sounding singing bowl. One of the physical reasons is that the contact point is so relatively small. The smaller the contact point, the more it creates audibility for the higher end overtones. It puts more energy into the top partials.
For the first time, we are sensing the 660 Hz and 1055 Hz frequencies in a real way. You get a bright strike on contact, and at the end of the tail it settles into a place more like the first two mallets. But in those first couple of seconds, it is perceived as a brighter, lighter singing bowl. Even though it is the same singing bowl.
Traditional hardwood · wrapped in a thin layer of suede
This is the most complete excitation. Struck on its side, letting mostly the velocity of the striker falling do the work, this mallet wakes up the dynamic range of this bowl and makes it all audible. The strong fundamental, the dominant third partial, and the most activation of the fifth and sixth octave partials.
It activates everything from 113 Hz to 1000 Hz, all audible in some capacity. This creates the most dynamic audible range representative of this bowl. The perception is almost the most bell-like tone the bowl can produce.
Same hardwood striker · rim playing instead of striking
Played around the rim, this bowl is so fundamental dominant. The 113 to 114 Hz layer is the primary audible tone. If you want the dominant fundamental, if you want to experience the low end register of this bowl with as little overtone presence as possible, play it around the rim.
There is, of course, some presence of the higher partials underneath. But the primary experience of hearing this bowl played around the rim is that deep, deep, low end register. Just the low end, focused.
Hard Delrin plastic · slick surface · made for us by Dragonfly Percussion
Delrin is a type of plastic, really hard and really slick. The experience is effectively the same as striking the bowl with bare hardwood. This one is the best at focusing on the higher end partials, to the point where the fundamental is almost not audible.
What you hear is that third partial, then the 660 Hz layer, then even the 1000 Hz range partial. This striker locks into the high end of the overtones and reveals the top of this bowl's range.
The context of this is often if you have a set built in 432 hertz. This is most common when people have a set of 7 or 9 or 13 crystal singing bowls and are coming to the Ohm Store after, wanting to add some of these handmade bronze singing bowls to the mix. The question is often, how does a particular bowl I'm interested in fit in with my 432 hertz perfect pitch tuned frosted crystal singing bowl set? The very easy answer is you can do the conversion.
So if a bowl that you're looking at at the Ohm Store is measured in 440 hertz base tuning, and you're wondering what that would be as a 432 hertz measurement, you can just multiply it, and you have a baseline for how to integrate other bowls into your set.
The best striker is only going to be answered after there is a follow-up question of: best for what?