The physics of the interaction of thermally or mechanically induced acoustic waves and the carrier fluid medium is a challenging problem with significant practical relevance. Thermoacoustic loudspeakers are devices that convert alternating current (ac) electrical signals to thermal energy, causing local fluctuations of the surrounding gas (air) pressure which generate acoustic waves. The thermoacoustic transduction is viewed as a promising technology for future implementation of small size loudspeakers. Both experimental and computational research results on the performance of thermoacoustic speakers are reported in this paper. Sound pressure waves generated by thermoacoustic speakers are simulated using a 3-D transient compressible Navier-Stokes solver. The solver adopts non-diffusive differencing scheme on convective terms and the Crank-Nicolson scheme for the transient term to solve for 3-D compressible continuity, momentum and energy equations. AC voltage is applied on a 6.0 cm by 8.0 cm thin wall constructed of free standing (no substrate) film of aligned carbon nanotubes to generate the time-varying heat flux, which in turn produces the pressure (acoustic) waves in the surrounding media (air). Sound pressure levels are measured in the experiments and are also calculated from the numerical simulations with various power inputs to the thin film speaker.