Sustain

The term sustain (English for maintaining, stamina ) refers to certain aspects of the acoustic sound behavior of sound generators. The term has two different meanings, depending on whether it is acoustic or electronically generated sounds.

Sustain in acoustic sound generators

In acoustic sound sources, especially in musical instruments, sustain denotes the length of Ausklingvorgangs a sound after it has been initiated manually or by machine.

Subsided, the physical decay of the sound-producing parts of instruments ( for example strings ) quickly after release and can consequently the volume of the sound produced by fast, the tone generator has a short sustain; considers this decay and thus the sound produced without re-operation of the tone generator for a long time to, one speaks of a long sustain.

During the sustain is extremely short in percussion instruments due to the rapid fading of the sound, the sustain can be theoretically infinite length on mechanical instruments ( such as in the organ). In piano 's sustain can be influenced by the right pedal that controls the damper of the strings.

The term sustain is not to be confused with the reverberation (English Reverberation ), as is established when sustain the sustaining signal from the instrument itself. When reverberation is a reflection of sound propagation in the air instead of or is produced in electronic reverberation devices, which behaves independently of the intrinsic duration of sound of an instrument.

Sustain with electronic sound generators

In electronically generated sound signals such as, for example, analog or digital synthesizers or samplers a phase of the envelope of the sound is referred to as sustain. Sustain there is the third of four idealized phases ( ADSR ) in the envelope of the sound volume and referred to no time, but the volume level of the tone in the quasi- steady state.