GW Piano — chirp into piano keysUniversity of Portsmouth

01 / THE INSPIRAL INSTRUMENT

A little gravity.
A different kind
of keyboard.

Two bodies draw closer. Frequency rises. Turn the signature of a cosmic collision into something you can play.

Play the keyboard ↓
h(t) / SYNTHETIC STRAINTIME →

02 / PLAY THE CHIRP

Your universe, in tune.

Enabled shortcuts play immediately on key-down. Tab + Enter or Space also works.
CLICK / TOUCH TO PLAY · COMPUTER KEYS A W S E D F T G Y H U J K

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The downloadable pack contains the original scientific waveforms.

03 / A POPULATION IN SOUND

Black holes, observed & played.

Loading note samples…

Play detections in chronological order at 100 ms intervals, or select a 30-second calendar timeline that preserves relative gaps including breaks between observing runs, with each event’s components starting together, using mass-scaled equal-mass, nonspinning model chirps. This replaces the played distribution. It builds event by event as sounds start; after all events it matches the catalog. Stopping early keeps only events already started. Uses the current Musical/Scientific mode; these are model sounds, not detector recordings. Press again to stop or cancel preparation. Highlighted background lines show the nearest piano notes as each event starts; exact catalog masses determine the audio. Each highlight clears when its component sound ends; overlapping sounds on the same note keep that line lit.

■ LVK components ▧ Lime stripes: played components · □ White: currently sounding│ Lines: keyboard notes

The purple bars show LVK components; lime-striped bars show played components. White bars mark bins containing sounds currently playing; they return to lime stripes when those sounds end. Muted solid lines behind the bars mark piano notes’ component masses within the 0–150 M☉ range (all 88 notes remain in the table). Every note through A2 is labelled, then every second semitone through A3, followed by A notes above A3. Colours repeat every octave (all Cs share a colour); the most recently played note has a thicker line. Hover over a line for its note, or open the note-mass table below. Exact counts are available in the table below. The mass axis is linear, with 2 M☉ bins. Both series fill each bin’s width. Bar heights are component counts per bin, on a shared vertical scale. Each successful note playback contributes two equal-mass bodies; repetitions count. Played masses assume zero redshift; catalog masses are source-frame medians. This is a comparison of sounds with detections, not a population inference.

Download catalog snapshot · GWOSC source
Histogram counts and bins
Component counts in each mass bin
Component mass (M☉)LVKPlayed
Keyboard notes and component masses
Note markers: equal mass per black hole at zero redshift
NoteFrequency (Hz)Component mass (M☉)

03 / BEHIND THE SOUND

From inspiral
to instrument.

A rising voice

LALSimulation generates equal-mass, nonspinning IMRPhenomD signals, including inspiral, merger, and ringdown. Each note sets the model’s merger–ringdown amplitude peak parameter f_peak. Mass scales inversely with note frequency.

A creative interpretation

These are model waveforms, not recorded detections. f_peak is a merger–ringdown model parameter, not the loudest bin of the full Fourier spectrum or the maximum instantaneous frequency. Samples are normalized and gently tapered for playback.

Take it to your sampler

The ZIP covers a full 88-key piano (A0–C8), with one mono WAV per key, note metadata, and an SFZ mapping. The web keyboard is a shorter playable selection. Use a compatible sampler or import WAVs manually. A hardware keyboard may need its manufacturer’s conversion tool.

TAKE THE INSTRUMENT WITH YOU

Download the full sound pack.

88-key sound pack · A0–C8 · WAV + SFZ · 44.1 kHz

Original scientific waveforms, without the synthetic musical tone.

Download sound pack ↗