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What is acoustic impedance and why is it

important?
Acoustic impedance, which has the symbol Z, is the ratio of acoustic pressure p to acoustic volume flow
U. So we define Z = p/U. Z usually varies strongly when you change the frequency. The acoustic
impedance at a particular frequency indicates how much sound pressure is generated by a given air vibration
at that frequency.
This introduction explains its use in understanding the operation of musical instruments. A more general
introduction, in physical terms, is given in Sound: impedance, power and intensity. For a review of
techniques for measuring acoustic impedance, see Dickens et al (2007). For the techniques developed in our
lab, see Acoustic impedance measurements.
The specific acoustic impedance z is a ratio of acoustic pressure to specific flow, which is the same as
flow per unit area, or flow velocity. In all cases, 'acoustic' refers to the oscillating component. With this
proviso, we can say that acoustic impedance Z = pressure/flow and specific acoustic impedance z =
pressure/velocity.
We discuss acoustic impedance on this music acoustics site because, for musical wind instruments, acoustic
impedance has the advantage of being a physical property of the instrument alone it can be measured (or
calculated) for the instrument without a player. It is a spectrum, because it has different values for different
frequencies one can think of it as the acoustic response of the instrument for all possible frequencies. For
instance, we measure it at the embouchure of an instrument because it tells us a lot about the way the
player's lips, reed or the air jet from the mouth will interact with the instrument itself. So it tells us about the
acoustic performance of the instrument, in an objective way that is independent of who might play it, and it
allows us to compare subtle differences between instruments. So what is it?
An analogy. Many people find helpful the analogy with electrical impedance. Spatial variations in electrical potential
(differences in voltage V) give rise to moving charge (electrical current i) and the electrical impedance z = V/i. Here, spatial
variations in acoustic pressure (p) give rise to air flow (U) and z = p/U. Here is an introduction to electrical impedance.
Resistance is a particular (and rather boring) example of impedance, which is the general term for a ratio of voltage to
current. DC (direct current) means constant or slowly varying current. AC (alternating current) means any current in which
the movement is alternately backwards and forwards (oscillating) with no overall motion. AC is more interesting because
the impedance can vary with the frequency of oscillation of the current. (These analogies are limited: air is compressible
so the flow does not obey Kirchoff's law about conservation of current.)
Consider the
opening to a duct.
The acoustic
impedance Z at
that opening is the
ratio of the acoustic
(or AC) pressure p
at the entry to the
duct to the volume
flow of fluid U into
it. Like electrical
impedance, acoustic
impedance may be a strong function of frequency. The graph shows the measured input impedance of a
simple cylindrical pipe (325 mm long, 15 mm in diameter) in Pa.s/m
3
, as a function of frequency. The
magnitude of Z varies by more than a factor of a thousand over this range of frequency. More about this
below.
The acoustic impedance is complicated by the fact that the current and pressure are not necessarily in phase
the maximum pressure may be ahead of the maximum flow, or vice versa. As in electricity, we use
complex numbers to handle this, where the real part represents the in-phase component and the imaginary
part the out-of-phase component.
Units. The unit of pressure is the pascal one newton per square metre. A pascal is a big unit for sound: an
oscillation of one Pa is usually a very loud sound indeed. (In DC the Pa seems a small unit: atmospheric
pressure is 100,000 Pa or 100 kPa.) Flow is measured in cubic metres per second. (A very gentle breeze
coming in your window could be 1 m
3
/s. But for 1 m
3
/s to flow down a pipe, either the pipe must be big
think ventilation ducts or the speed must be high.) The units for impedance are therefore Pa.s/m
3
, which
we call the acoustic ohm . For musical instruments, it is a rather small unit, so we use megohms: MPa.s/m
3
.
Finally, sound pressures have a large range. For this and other, psychophysical reasons we use logarithmic
scales for sound level and impedance. (For a linear quantity like sound pressure or impedance, you can
convert to dB by taking the log of any ratio, then multiplying by 20.)
For an infinitely long pipe, with cross sectional area S and filled with a medium of density and speed of
sound c, the acoustic impedance is c/S. (See Sound: impedance, power and intensity) So, for an infinitely
long pipe with diameter 10 mm filled with air, the acoustic impedance is 5 M. In our lab, we routinely use
pipes whose effective length is infinite as references, as well as other calibration. This allows us to make
measurements of impedance spectra over 9 octaves (10 to 4000 Hz) using a single impedance head. See
Dickens et al (2007) .
Specific acoustic impedance*. In contrast to Z, the quantity z = c doesn't depend on the size of the pipe:
it is a property of the medium alone, called the specific acoustic impedance, and its units are Pa.s/m. The
specific acoustic impedance is the ratio of p to the flow per unit area U/A. U/A equals the acoustic velocity:
the velocity of particles in the medium due to their motion in the sound wave. It is worth warning that, in
some fields such as ultrasound imaging, practitioners sometimes informally say 'acoustic impedance' when
they mean specific acoustic impedance. The specific acoustic impedance for air is about 420 Pa.s/m (the
exact value depends on temperature and pressure) and about 1.5 MPa.s/m in water, i.e. about 3600 times
higher for water. Virtually all condensed phases have high values of z, which accounts for the very high
reflection coefficients at gas-condensed phase or condensed phase-gas interfaces.
* Specific acoustic impedance is sometimes also called the 'characteristic acoustic impedance of a medium'. Be careful,
because 'characteristic acoustic impedance' has another meaning: for a pipe of cross section S and undetermined length,
the characteristic acoustic impedance of the pipe is Z
0
= c/S. Sometimes, in informal use, specific acoustic impedance is
even called the acoustic impedance of a medium. This last use is potentially very confusing!
Note that we have referred to an infinite pipe in the example above. In such a pipe, a varying pressure
causes a wave which is a varying flow of air, and which never comes back.
In a finite pipe, however, the wave reflects at the far end (whether it be closed or open) and comes back,
reflects again, and gives rise to standing waves or resonances (see pipes and harmonics). This causes the
impedance to be much higher or lower than the value calculated above, depending on whether the pressure
of the returning wave is in phase or out of phase with the driving pressure.
The figure at right (from a paper by Chen et al, 2009) shows the measured impedance spectra for a cylinder
(bottom), a flute, a clarinet, a soprano saxophone and a cone (whose apex is replaced by a cylindridal
section of the same volume, so as to allow a measurement). In all cases, the impedance becomes small at
very low frequency: little pressure difference is required to pump air through a short pipe at low frequency.
The first peak corresponds to the frequency of the animation shown on the web page about cylindrical pipes.
The acoustic impedance of musical wind instruments varies spectacularly with frequency because these
instruments are designed to produce one or several frequencies only in a particular configuration. For
example, the flute is played with the embouchure hole (at least partly) open to the atmosphere, so the
pressure at the embouchure hole is very near to atmospheric pressure. Thus the acoustic pressure (the
varying part) is
nearly zero. The
flow is provided by
a jet of air from
between the
player's lips.
Oscillations of air
flow in the flute can
cause this jet to
deflect upwards
(outside the flute) or
downwards (inside)
so that the acoustic
flow (the AC
component) can be
large. Thus the flute
operates at minima
of Z: a small
pressure and a large
flow. Most other
wind instruments
have a reed which is
sealed by the
player's mouth and
they operate at
maxima of Z: the
varying part of the
pressure is large,
but the oscillating
part of the air flow
is small at the reed.
See Flutes vs
Clarinets and Pipes
and resonances for
more details to
examine simple
cases. Many
examples of
impedance spectra
are given on our
sites for the flute,
the clarinet, the
saxophone and
brass instruments.
In each of the impedance curves for the flute, there are at least a few rather deep, sharp minima, and the flute
will usually play a note with a frequency near each of those deep minima. The ease of playing and the
stability of the note depend on the depth and narrowness of the minima.
Conversely, in each of the impedance curves for the clarinet, saxophone and brass instruments, there are at
least a few rather high, sharp maxima, and those instruments will often play a note with a frequency near
each of those high maxima. The ease of playing and the stability of the note depend on the height and
narrowness of the maxima. For instance the very highest notes are hard to play, and you can see on the
spectra that at high frequency the maxima and minima are weakerthey "help the player less". There is
more to it than this, however. For the instrument to play properly a note with frequency f, it sometimes needs
an extremum at f, and also extrema at 2f, 3f, 4f etc. The reason for this is that the vibration of the air jet or
reed and the sound made by the flute are not simple sine waves. Their waves are periodic waves (that is they
repeat in time) and they contain a fundamental and a harmonic series. It is important to the performance of
wind instruments that the various minima that help produce a particular note are in the harmonic series. See
"How harmonic are harmonics?" and "How do woodwind instruments work?"
On our sites for the flute, clarinet and saxophone, it is helpful to look at the Z curve for the lowest note for an
explanation of some of the general features of that instrument's impedance spectrum.
Why is Acoustic Impedance Important?
The acoustic impedance of an instrument for any particular fingering is one of the major factors which
determines the acoustic response of the instrument in that fingering. It determines which notes can be played
with that fingering, how stable they are and it also helps determine whether they are in tune.
The acoustic impedance also has a large influence on the sound produced. To see some examples of this,
have a look at the two different fingerings for the same note. On the flute, one could look at A#4 (the "long"
fingering using the RH index finger, and the "short" fingering using only the LH thumb). Look in particular at
the relative depths of the 3rd and 5th minima in the impedance spectrum, and at the strengths of the 3rd and
5th harmonics of the sound produced. Look also at the two different fingerings given for A4, the relative
depths of the harmonic minima, and the effect that they have on the timbre produced. Another difference that
is worth looking at is the difference made by a "split E" mechanism. Look at the different Z spectra for E6
with and without the mechanism, and compare them with that for the note A5. Then try the experiment of
slurring between A5 and E6 on flutes with and without the mechanism. Our databases for clarinet and
saxophone also provide many examples.
Another thing which has a big influence on the sound is the player, but that is another story and it is rather
more complicated. Indeed a big advantage in measuring Z is that it gives us an objective measurement of the
instrument alone. In that way it is in some ways more useful to scientists and to makers than the sound of the
instrument. If you get a poor sound from an instrument, it might be because the player is poor, or it might be
because the instrument is poor. With our industrial collaborators, Terry McGee and The Woodwind Group,
we are working to obtain objective comparisons of different instruments, to analyse the differences in their
acoustic properties and to explain their different musical performance.
More about acoustic impedance
An introduction to acoustic impedance in the context of physics is given in Sound: impedance,
power and intensity.
For the measurement techniques developed in our lab, see Acoustic impedance measurements.
For a review of techniques for measuring acoustic impedance, see Dickens et al (2007).
Acoustic impedance is somewhat analogous to electrical impedance.

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