Public Lectures

David wrote the IEE Faraday Lecture for 2004 with Andy Hunt and Damian Murphy. It toured the UK between January and March 2004, was seen by approximately 20,000 secondary school children live, and up to a total of 3,000,000 worldwide via satellite.

Professor David M Howard gave a Friday Evening Discourse at the Royal Institution of Great Britain in London on 30th January 1998 on The Human Singing Voice which was illustrated with live singing from Ms Jean Collingsworth.

David gave the 1998 Merchant Adventurers' Science Discovery Lecture with Andy Hunt. This was the second annual lecture under an agreement between the Merchant Adventurers' Company and the University of York to put some of the work at the University in front of a public local audience.

Michael Fabricant MP hosted a reception on the House of Commons Terrace to mark the formation on 30/03/06 of the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) following the merger of the Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE) and the Institution of Oncorporated Engineers (IIE). Lord Sainsbury proposed the toast, and David had a chance to talk to him about the importance of creativity in engineering and the need to encourage more young people into the field (pictured). David is a Vice President and Trustee of the IET.

• How does the voice work?
• Which foods and drinks are good/bad for your voice and why?
• How is the voice observed and operated upon in hospital?

As part of National Science Week, Professor David M Howard illustrated these questions with posters, demonstrations and displays for schools (Thursday and Friday) and the general public (Saturday). Demonstrations included: measure how many larynx cycles you can sing in one breath; eating chocolate, which is not good for the voice, to discover how its effect can be altered with acid, how voice pitch is varied, find your Adam's apple, video of vocal fold/vocal cord observation, display of larynx operating instruments.

• How are sounds created electronically?
• How are they controlled for making music?
• How might sounds be controlled in the future?

These and other aspects of making music with technology were discussed and illustrated with hands-on demonstrations, culminating with a live (barely rehearsed!) duet between David and the Headmaster.

• How does the voice work when singing?
• How can computer analysis of the voice help with professional vocal training?

To help examine these questions the David was accompanied by eight York Minster choristers (4 boys and 4 girls) with their Master of the Music, Philip Moore, by kind permission of the Dean and Chapter of York Minster. They demonstrated the importance of vocal warm-up, tuning, diction and choral blend.

A day of activities in Bristol Cathedral to encourage young boys to sing. Fewer boys are singing nowadays, and this event is part of an initiative led by Dr Martin Ashley (University of the West of England) to encourage boys into singing. Boys were invited along to sing with the Bristol Cathedral boy choristers, and to find out more about how their voices work with David Howard. Activities included: breathing, finding your Adam's apple, how the larynx works, acoustic amplification using talking tape, voice processing, computer displays of voice, and the electrolaryngograph.

With equipment available so sounds could be created and interfaces could be demonstrated live. Allowing David to tackle questions such as:

• What are the basic principles behind electronic sound generation?
• How can a musician control sounds when making music?
• What methods are available for those who do not play the piano?

This event brought together those interested in how engineering is portayed in television drama. A stage version of a pilot episode of an engineering soap, Happy Valley by Tony McHale, was presented to trigger discussion, and the day ended with presentations of awards for the best television science programmes. David was one of the award presenters.

This lecture was acoustically illustrated with live singing from a soprano, Helena Daffern. The science of the singing voice was demonstrated using real-time displays of Helena's voice as she sang songs to David's accompaniment. Voice source, acoustic resonance, vowel clarity, breath control and posture were all explored.

For teachers to inspire young children to think about contemporary scientific issues such as global warming, food supply, energy supply, and GM crops, it is important that they understand the basis of scientific research methodology. This talk developed a model of the scientific investigative process and considered how it works in research and in forensic work.

Tackling questions such as:

• How does the voice work?
• What is the physical nature of the sound production process in speech and singing?
• What aspects can be quantified?
• How does acoustic redundancy in speech allow engineers to reduce the telephone bandwidth?
• How can speech and singing be synthesised electronically?

Most of us take our voice for granted and only become aware of it when it goes wrong. How does the voice work? Why does it go wrong? What preventative steps can you take to look after your voice in a more healthy manner? What changes during the voice training for professional singers, cathedral choristers and actors? How are electronic voices created? These are some of the questions that will be addressed during this talk which will be supported with illustrations, healthy voice guidelines, electronic sounds and a number of hands-on experiments.