News

Published: 09 July 2020

Investigations of the spread of breathing air when playing wind instruments and singing

Against the background of the COVID-19 pandemic and on the basis of previous studies, the spread of breathing air when playing wind instruments and singing was investigated further.

At the end of May, first measurements in front of the schlieren mirror were conducted to visualize the spread of breathing air when playing wind instruments and singing.

Based on these measurements, further investigations with the BOS method were conducted on July 8, 2020 in cooperation with the Staatskapelle Weimar and its orchestra director Nils Kretschmer. The BOS system offers the advantage of recording a larger measuring field to capture airflows that escaped over the edge of the schlieren mirror in previous investigations. Furthermore, the flow velocities of the breathing air escaping from the instruments were recorded.

These investigations resulted in a first update of the risk assessment on the spread of breathing air when playing wind instruments and singing during the COVID-19 pandemic. The report can be found here.

An article in the Thüringische Landeszeitung about the measurements with the BOS method can be found here.

Thüringen Philharmonie Gotha - Eisenach Schlieren

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