What is sound?

Before working with web audio, it’s important to understand not only the terminology but some of the concepts of sound and waves. You may be familiar with the fact that sounds travels in waves, but are perhaps not too sure what this actually means. Well, imagine the waves of the ocean. The water on surface of the ocean travels forward, whilst moving up and down, up and down and up and down. Now picture this motion happening in the air rather than in water. Speed it up to a ridiculous speed (767 mph) and bingo. This is how sound works. Sound is basically the air vibrating. These vibrations have the physical knock-on effect of causing your ear drum to vibrate, which in turn causes tiny little hair cells to vibrate. Then there’s some goo involved and your brain does something for you to understand what you heard. It’s nuts.