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Increasingly, colleges are offering intro courses on the science of sound. The idea is to introduce non-scientists to acoustics and to science. The course is usually one semester long and requires no prerequisite. The audience is a diverse mix of non-technical majors, from musicians looking to hone their craft to liberal arts majors looking for an interesting science elective.

The course presents instructors with a unique opportunity to reach students who might not otherwise take physics. The challenge is to bring these students a meaningful and positive experience with science that has practical meaning for their lives as non-scientists.

This book is written for high school and college students who do not have much background in science or math. The book deliberately avoids incorporating basic physics topics (like force, energy and pressure) beyond what is absolutely needed for the book. The math is mostly at the 8th grade level- algebra, graph reading, ratio and proportion. There’s no calculus. There’s no trigonometry. The hardest math (logs and roots) is in the sections on decibels and musical intervals. (These sections can be skipped without disrupting the flow of the book).

A musical background is not required to understand this book, but it helps. Musicians have valuable experiences- producing sound, listening carefully to sound and (perhaps) reading music. I’ve brought in musical topics in the main text to help those with a musical background understand the material better.

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