The string objected to being stretched.  Strings are pretty grumpy in general.  Once they are pulled taught in place, they object to pretty much everything until they break.  This particular stretch was implemented by Joseph: a professional musician.  Joseph spent a lot of time stretching this string, and others like it.  He pulled them out across a board until their screams of complaint matched some socratic ideal.  Then he manipulated the string so that different parts of it were exposed to his plucking, and gave only them the opportunity to complain, but he wouldn't ever listen.  Once they had complained enough, people applauded.