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WIKIMAG n. 7 - Giugno 2013
Musical instrument
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A
musical instrument is a device created or adapted to make musical
sounds. In principle, any object that produces
sound can
be a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a
musical instrument. The history of musical instruments dates to the
beginnings of human culture. Early musical instruments may have used for
ritual:[citation
needed] such as a
trumpet
to signal success on the hunt, or a
drum in a
religious ceremony. Cultures eventually developed composition and
performance of
melodies
for entertainment.[citation
needed] Musical instruments evolved in step with
changing applications.
The date and origin of the first device considered a musical
instrument is disputed. The oldest object that some scholars refer to as
a musical instrument, a simple
flute,
dates back as far as 67,000 years. Some consensus dates early flutes to
about 37,000 years ago. However, most historians believe that
determining a specific time of musical instrument invention is
impossible due to the subjectivity of the definition and the relative
instability of materials used to make them. Many early musical
instruments were made from animal skins, bone, wood, and other
non-durable materials.
Musical instruments developed independently in many populated regions
of the world. However, contact among civilizations caused rapid spread
and adaptation of most instruments in places far from their origin. By
the
Middle Ages, instruments from
Mesopotamia were in
Maritime Southeast Asia, and Europeans played instruments from North
Africa. Development in the Americas occurred at a slower pace, but
cultures of North, Central, and South America shared musical
instruments. By 1400, musical instrument development slowed in many
areas and was dominated by the
Occident.
Musical instrument classification is a discipline in its own right,
and many systems of classification have been used over the years.
Instruments can be classified by their effective range, their material
composition, their size, etc. However, the most common academic method,
Hornbostel-Sachs, uses the means by which they produce sound. The
academic study of musical instruments is called
organology.
Definition and basic operation
A musical instrument makes sounds. Once humans moved from making
sounds with their bodies—for example, by clapping—to using objects to
create music from sounds, musical instruments were born.[1]
Primitive instruments were probably designed to emulate natural sounds,
and their purpose was ritual rather than entertainment. The concept of
melody and the artistic pursuit of musical composition were unknown to
early players of musical instruments. A player sounding a flute to
signal the start of a hunt does so without thought of the modern notion
of "making music".[2]
Musical instruments are constructed in a broad array of styles and
shapes, using many different materials. Early musical instruments were
made from "found objects" such a shells and plant parts.[2]
As instruments evolved, so did the selection and quality of materials.
Virtually every material in nature has been used by at least one culture
to make musical instruments.[2]
One plays a musical instrument by interacting with it in some way—for
example, by plucking the strings on a
string instrument.
Archaeology
Researchers have discovered archaeological evidence of musical
instruments in many parts of the world. Some finds are 67,000 years old,
however their status as musical instruments is often in dispute.
Consensus solidifies about artifacts dated back to around 37,000 years
old and later. Only artifacts made from durable materials or using
durable methods tend to survive. As such, the specimens found cannot be
irrefutably placed as the earliest musical instruments.[3]
In July 1995, Slovenian archaeologist Ivan Turk discovered a bone
carving in the northwest region of
Slovenia. The carving, named the
Divje Babe flute, features four holes that Canadian musicologist Bob
Fink determined could have been used to play four notes of a
diatonic scale. Researchers estimate the flute's age at between
43,400 and 67,000 years, making it the oldest known musical instrument
and the only musical instrument associated with the
Neanderthal culture.[4]
However, some archaeologists and ethnomusicologists dispute the flute's
status as a musical instrument.[5]
German archaeologists have found
mammoth
bone and swan
bone flutes dating back to 30,000 to 37,000 years old in the
Swabian Alps. The flutes were made in the
Upper Paleolithic age, and are more commonly accepted as being the
oldest known musical instruments.[6]
Archaeological evidence of musical instruments was discovered in
excavations at the Royal Cemetery in the
Sumerian
city of Ur (see
Lyres of Ur). These instruments, one of the first ensembles of
instruments yet discovered, include nine
lyres, two
harps, a
silver double
flute,
sistra and
cymbals.
A set of reed-sounded silver pipes discovered in Ur was the likely
predecessor of modern
bagpipes.[7]
The cylindrical pipes feature three side-holes that allowed players to
produce whole tone scales.[8]
These excavations, carried out by
Leonard Woolley in the 1920s, uncovered non-degradable fragments of
instruments and the voids left by the degraded segments that, together,
have been used to reconstruct them.[9]
The graves these instruments were buried in have been
carbon dated to between 2600 and 2500 BCE, providing evidence that
these instruments were used in Sumeria by this time.[10]
Archaeologists in the
Jiahu
site of central Henan province of China have found flutes made of bones
that date back 7,000 to 9,000 years,[11]
representing some of the "earliest complete, playable, tightly-dated,
multinote musical instruments" ever found.[11][12]
History
Scholars agree that there are no completely reliable methods of
determining the exact chronology of musical instruments across cultures.
Comparing and organizing instruments based on their complexity is
misleading, since advancements in musical instruments have sometimes
reduced complexity. For example, construction of early
slit
drums involved felling and hollowing out large trees; later slit
drums were made by opening bamboo stalks, a much simpler task.[13]
Curt Sachs argued that is misleading to arrange the development of
musical instruments by workmanship since all cultures advance at
different levels and have access to different materials. For example,
contemporary
anthropologists attempting to compare musical instruments made by
two cultures that existed at the same time but who differed in
organization, culture, and handicraft
cannot determine which instruments are more "primitive".[14]
Ordering instruments by geography is also partially unreliable, as one
cannot determine when and how cultures contacted one another and shared
knowledge.
German musicologist
Curt Sachs, one of the most prominent musicologists[15]
and musical ethnologists[16]
in modern times, proposed that a geographical chronology until
approximately 1400 is preferable, however, due to its limited
subjectivity.[17]
Beyond 1400, one can follow the overall development of musical
instruments by time period.[17]
The science of marking the order of musical instrument development
relies on archaeological artifacts, artistic depictions, and literary
references. Since data in one research path can be inconclusive, all
three paths provide a better historical picture.[3]
Primitive
and prehistoric
Two
Aztec slit drums, called teponaztli. The
characteristic " H" slits can be seen on the top of
the drum in the foreground
Until the 19th century AD, European written music histories began
with mythological accounts of how musical instruments were invented.
Such accounts included
Jubal, descendant of
Cain and "father of all such as handle the harp and the organ",
Pan, inventor of the
pan
pipes, and
Mercury, who is said to have made a dried
tortoise shell into the first
lyre.
Modern histories have replaced such mythology with anthropological
speculation, occasionally informed by archeological evidence. Scholars
agree that there was no definitive "invention" of the musical instrument
since the definition of the term "musical instrument" is completely
subjective to both the scholar and the would-be inventor. For example, a
Homo habilis slapping his body could be the makings of a musical
instrument regardless of the being's intent.[18]
Among the first devices external to the human body that are
considered instruments are
rattles, stampers, and various
drums.[19]
These earliest instruments evolved due to the human motor impulse to add
sound to emotional movements such as dancing.[20]
Eventually, some cultures assigned ritual functions to their musical
instruments, using them for hunting and various ceremonies.[21]
Those cultures developed more complex percussion instruments and other
instruments such as ribbon reeds, flutes, and trumpets. Some of these
labels carry far different connotations from those used in modern day;
early flutes and trumpets are so-labeled for their basic operation and
function rather than any resemblance to modern instruments.[22]
Among early cultures for whom drums developed ritual, even sacred
importance are the
Chukchi people of the
Russian Far East, the indigenous people of
Melanesia, and many cultures of
Africa.
In fact, drums were pervasive throughout every African culture.[23]
One East African tribe, the
Wahinda,
believed it was so holy that seeing a drum would be fatal to any person
other than the sultan.[24]
Humans eventually developed the concept of using musical instruments
for producing a
melody.
Until this time in the evolutions of musical instruments, melody was
common only in singing. Similar to the process of
reduplication in language, instrument players first developed
repetition and then arrangement. An early form of melody was produced by
pounding two stamping tubes of slightly different sizes—one tube would
produce a "clear" sound and the other would answer with a "darker"
sound. Such instrument pairs also included
bullroarers, slit drums, shell trumpets, and skin drums. Cultures
who used these instrument pairs associated genders with them; the
"father" was the bigger or more energetic instrument, while the "mother"
was the smaller or duller instrument. Musical instruments existed in
this form for thousands of years before patterns of three or more tones
would evolve in the form of the earliest
xylophone.[25]
Xylophones originated in the mainland and archipelago of
Southeast Asia, eventually spreading to Africa, the Americas, and
Europe.[26]
Along with xylophones, which ranged from simple sets of three "leg bars"
to carefully tuned sets of parallel bars, various cultures developed
instruments such as the
ground harp,
ground
zither,
musical bow, and
jaw
harp.[27]
Antiquity
Images of musical instruments begin to appear in Mesopotamian
artifacts in 2800 BC or earlier. Beginning around 2000 BC,
Sumerian
and
Babylonian cultures began delineating two distinct classes of
musical instruments due to
division of labor and the evolving class system. Popular
instruments, simple and playable by anyone, evolved differently from
professional instruments whose development focused on effectiveness and
skill.[28]
Despite this development, very few musical instruments have been
recovered in
Mesopotamia. Scholars must rely on artifacts and
cuneiform texts written in
Sumerian or
Akkadian to reconstruct the early history of musical instruments in
Mesopotamia. Even the process of assigning names to these instruments is
challenging since there is no clear distinction among various
instruments and the words used to describe them.[29]
Although Sumerian and Babylonian artists mainly depicted ceremonial
instruments, historians have been able to distinguish six
idiophones used in early Mesopotamia: concussion clubs, clappers,
sistra,
bells, cymbals, and rattles.[30]
Sistra are depicted prominently in a great relief of
Amenhotep III,[31]
and are of particular interest because similar designs have been found
in far-reaching places such as
Tbilisi,
Georgia and among the Native American
Yaqui tribe.[32]
The people of Mesopotamia preferred stringed instruments to any other,
as evidenced by their proliferation in Mesopotamian figurines, plaques,
and seals. Innumerable varieties of harps are depicted, as well as lyres
and lutes, the forerunner of modern stringed instruments such as the
violin.[33]
Musical instruments used by the Egyptian culture before 2700 BC bore
striking similarity to those of Mesopotamia, leading historians to
conclude that the civilizations must have been in contact with one
another. Sachs notes that Egypt did not possess any instruments that the
Sumerian culture did not also possess.[34]
However, by 2700 BC the cultural contacts seem to have dissipated; the
lyre, a prominent ceremonial instrument in Sumer, did not appear in
Egypt for another 800 years.[34]
Clappers and concussion sticks appear on Egyptian vases as early as 3000
BC. The civilization also made use of sistra, vertical flutes, double
clarinets, arched and angular harps, and various drums.[35]
Little history is available in the period between 2700 BC and 1500
BC, as Egypt (and indeed, Babylon) entered a long violent period of war
and destruction. This period saw the
Kassites destroy the Babylonian empire in Mesopotamia and the
Hyksos
destroy the
Middle Kingdom of Egypt. When the Pharaohs of Egypt conquered
Southwest Asia in around 1500 BC, the cultural ties to Mesopotamia were
renewed and Egypt's musical instruments also reflected heavy influence
from Asiatic cultures.[34]
Under their new cultural influences, the people of the
New Kingdom began using oboes, trumpets, lyres, lutes, castanets,
and cymbals.[36]
In contrast with Mesopotamia and Egypt, professional musicians did
not exist in
Israel
between 2000 and 1000 BC. While the history of musical instruments in
Mesopotamia and Egypt relies on artistic representations, the culture in
Israel produced few such representations. Scholars must therefore rely
on information gleaned from the
Bible and
the Talmud.[37]
The Hebrew texts mention two prominent instruments associated with
Jubal, ugabs and
kinnors.
These may be translated as pan pipes and lyres, respectively.[38]
Other instruments of the period included tofs, or frame drums, small
bells or jingles called pa'amon,
shofars,
and the trumpet-like hasosra.[39]
The introduction of a monarchy in Israel during the 11th century BC
produced the first professional musicians and with them a drastic
increase in the number and variety of musical instruments.[40]
However, identifying and classifying the instruments remains a challenge
due to the lack of artistic interpretations. For example, stringed
instruments of uncertain design called nevals and asors existed, but
neither archaeology nor etymology can clearly define them.[41]
In her book A Survey of Musical Instruments, American
musicologist Sibyl Marcuse proposes that the nevel must be similar to
vertical harp due to its relation to "nabla", the Phoenician term for
"harp".[42]
In
Greece,
Rome, and
Etruria,
the use and development of musical instruments stood in stark contrast
to those cultures' achievements in architecture and sculpture. The
instruments of the time were simple and virtually all of them were
imported from other cultures.[43]
Lyres were the principal instrument, as musicians used them to honor the
gods.[44]
Greeks played a variety of wind instruments they classified as aulos
(reeds) or syrinx (flutes); Greek writing from that time reflects
a serious study of reed production and playing technique.[8]
Romans played reed instruments named tibia featuring side-holes
that could be opened or closed, allowing for greater flexibility in
playing modes.[45]
Other instruments in common use in the region included vertical harps
derived from those of the
Orient,
lutes of Egyptian design, various pipes and organs, and clappers, which
were played primarily by women.[46]
Evidence of musical instruments in use by early civilizations of
India is
almost completely lacking, making it impossible to reliably attribute
instruments to the
Munda and
Dravidian language-speaking cultures that first settled the area.
Rather, the history of musical instruments in the area begins with the
Indus Valley Civilization that emerged around 3000 BC. Various
rattles and whistles found among excavated artifacts are the only
physical evidence of musical instruments.[47]
A clay statuette indicates the use of drums, and examination of the
Indus script has also revealed representations of vertical arched
harps identical in design to those depicted in Sumerian artifacts. This
discovery is among many indications that the Indus Valley and Sumerian
cultures maintained cultural contact. Subsequent developments in musical
instruments in India occurred with the
Rigveda,
or hymns. These songs used various drums, shell trumpets, harps, and
flutes.[48]
Other prominent instruments in use during the early centuries AD were
the
snake charmer's
double clarinet,
bagpipes, barrel drums, cross flutes, and short lutes. In all, India
had no unique musical instruments until the
Middle Ages.[49]
A Chinese wooden fish, used in Buddhist recitations
Musical instruments such as
zithers
appeared in Chinese writings around 12th century BC and earlier.[50]
Early
Chinese philosophers such as
Confucius (551–479 BC),
Mencius
(372–289 BC), and
Laozi
shaped the development of musical instruments in China, adopting an
attitude toward music similar to that of the Greeks. The Chinese
believed that music was an essential part of character and community,
and developed a unique system of classifying their musical instruments
according to their material makeup.[51]
Idiophones were extremely important in Chinese music, hence the
majority of early instruments were idiophones. Poetry of the
Shang Dynasty mentions bells, chimes, drums, and globular flutes
carved from bone, the latter of which has been excavated and preserved
by archaeologists.[52]
The
Zhou Dynasty saw percussion instruments such as clappers, troughs,
wooden fish, and
yu. Wind instruments such as flute, pan-pipes, pitch-pipes, and
mouth organs also appeared in this time period.[53]
The
xiao and various other instruments that spread through many
cultures, came into use in China during and after the
Han Dynasty.[54]
Although civilizations in
Central America attained a relatively high level of sophistication
by the eleventh century AD, they lagged behind other civilizations in
the development of musical instruments. For example, they had no
stringed instruments; all of their instruments were idiophones, drums,
and wind instruments such as flutes and trumpets. Of these, only the
flute was capable of producing a melody.[55]
In contrast,
pre-Columbian
South American civilizations in areas such as modern-day
Peru,
Colombia,
Ecuador,
Bolivia,
and Chile
were less advanced culturally but more advanced musically. South
American cultures of the time used pan-pipes as well as varieties of
flutes, idiophones, drums, and shell or wood trumpets.[56]
Middle Ages
During the period of time loosely referred to as the
Middle Ages, China developed a tradition of integrating musical
influence from other regions. The first record of this type of influence
is in 384 AD, when China established an orchestra in its imperial court
after a conquest in
Turkestan. Influences from Middle East, Persia, India, Mongolia, and
other countries followed. In fact, Chinese tradition attributes many
musical instruments from this period to those regions and countries.[57]
Cymbals gained popularity, along with more advanced trumpets, clarinets,
oboes, flutes, drums, and lutes.[58]
Some of the first bowed-zithers appeared in China in the 9th or 10th
century, influenced by Mongolian culture.[59]
India experienced similar development to China in the Middle Ages;
however, stringed instruments developed differently to accommodate
different styles of music. While stringed instruments of China were
designed to produce precise tones capable of matching the tones of
chimes, stringed instruments of India were considerably more flexible.
This flexibility suited the slides and
tremolos of Hindu music. Rhythm was of paramount importance in
Indian music of the time, as evidenced by the frequent depiction of
drums in reliefs dating to the Middle Ages. The emphasis on rhythm is an
aspect native to Indian music.[60]
Historians divide the development of musical instruments in medieval
India between pre-Islamic and Islamic periods due to the different
influence each period provided.[61]
In pre-Islamic times, idiophones such hand bells, cymbals, and
peculiar instruments resembling gongs came into wide use in Hindu music.
The gong-like instrument was a bronze disk that was struck with a hammer
instead of a mallet. Tubular drums, stick zithers named
veena,
short fiddles, double and triple flutes, coiled trumpets, and curved
India horns emerged in this time period.[62]
Islamic influences brought new types of drums, perfectly circular or
octagonal as opposed to the irregular pre-Islamic drums.[63]
Persian influence brought oboes and
sitars, although Persian sitars had three strings and Indian version
had from four to seven.[64]
Southeast Asian musical innovations include those during a period of
Indian influence that ended around 920 AD.[65]
Balinese and
Javanese music made use of
xylophones and
metallophones, bronze versions of the former.[66]
The most prominent and important musical instrument of Southeast Asia
was the gong. While the gong likely originated in the geographical area
between Tibet
and Burma,
it was part of every category of human activity in
Maritime Southeast Asia including
Java.[67]
The areas of Mesopotamia and the
Arabian Peninsula experiences rapid growth and sharing of musical
instruments once they were united by
Islamic culture in the seventh century.[68]
Frame drums and cylindrical drums of various depths were immensely
important in all genres of music.[69]
Conical oboes were involved in the music that accompanied wedding and
circumcision ceremonies. Persian miniatures provide information on the
development of
kettle
drums in Mesopotamia that spread as far as Java.[70]
Various lutes, zithers,
dulcimers, and harps spread as far as
Madagascar to the south and modern-day
Sulawesi to the east.[71]
Despite the influences of Greece and Rome, most musical instruments
in Europe during the Middles Ages came from Asia. The lyre is the only
musical instrument that may have been invented in Europe until this
period.[72]
Stringed instruments were prominent in Middle Age Europe. The central
and northern regions used mainly lutes, stringed instruments with
necks, while the southern region used lyres, which featured a
two-armed body and a crossbar.[72]
Various harps served Central and Northern Europe as far north as
Ireland, where the harp eventually became a national symbol.[73]
Lyres propagated through the same areas, as far east as
Estonia.[74]
European music between 800 and 1100 became more sophisticated, more
frequently requiring instruments capable of
polyphony. The
Persian geographer of the 9th century (Ibn
Khordadbeh), mentioned in his lexicographical discussion of music
instruments that in the
Byzantine Empire typical instruments included the urghun (organ),
shilyani (probably a type of
harp or
lyre),
salandj (probably a
bagpipe) and the
Byzantine lyra (Greek: λύρα ~ lūrā).[75]
Lyra was a
medieval
pear-shaped
bowed string instrument with three to five
strings, held upright and is an ancestor of most European bowed
instruments, including the
violin.[76]
The
monochord served as a precise measure of the notes of a musical
scale, allowing more accurate musical arrangements.[77]
Mechanical
hurdy-gurdies allowed single musicians to play more complicated
arrangements than a fiddle would; both were prominent folk instruments
in the Middle Ages.[78][79]
Southern Europeans played short and long lutes whose pegs extended to
the sides, unlike the rear-facing pegs of Central and Northern European
instruments.[80]
Idiophones such as bells and clappers served various practical purposes,
such as warning of the approach of a
leper.[81]
The ninth century revealed the first
bagpipes, which spread throughout Europe and had many uses from folk
instruments to military instruments.[82]
The construction of pneumatic
organs evolved in Europe starting in fifth century
Spain,
spreading to
England
in about 700.[83]
The resulting instruments varied in size and use from portable organs
worn around the neck to large pipe organs.[84]
Literary accounts of organs being played in English
Benedictine abbeys toward the end of the tenth century are the first
references to organs being connected to churches.[85]
Reed players of the Middle Ages were limited to oboes; no evidence of
clarinets exists during this period.[86]
Modern
Renaissance
Musical instrument development was dominated by the
Occident from 1400 on—indeed, the most profound changes occurred
during the
Renaissance period. Instruments took on other purposes than
accompanying singing or dance, and performers used them as solo
instruments. Keyboards and lutes developed as polyphonic instruments,
and composers arranged increasingly complex pieces using more advanced
tablature. Composers also began designing pieces of music for
specific instruments.[18]
In the latter half of the sixteenth century,
orchestration came into common practice as a method of writing music
for a variety of instruments. Composers now specified orchestration
where individual performers once applied their own discretion.[87]
The polyphonic style dominated popular music, and the instrument makers
responded accordingly.[88]
Beginning in about 1400, the rate of development of musical
instruments increased in earnest as compositions demanded more dynamic
sounds. People also began writing books about creating, playing, and
cataloging musical instruments; the first such book was
Sebastian Virdung's 1511 treatise Musica getuscht und ausgezogen
(English: Music Germanized and Abstracted).[87]
Virdung's work is noted as being particularly thorough for including
descriptions of "irregular" instruments such as hunters' horns and cow
bells, though Virdung is critical of the same. Other books followed,
including
Arnolt Schlick's Spiegel der Orgelmacher und Organisten
(English: Mirror of Organ Makers and Organ Players) the following
year, a treatise on organ building and organ playing.[89]
Of the instructional books and references published in the Renaissance
era, one is noted for its detailed description and depiction of all wind
and stringed instruments, including their relative sizes. This book, the
Syntagma musicum by Michael Praetorius, is now considered an
authoritative reference of sixteenth century musical instruments.[90]
In the sixteenth century, musical instrument builders gave most
instruments, such as the violin, the "classical shapes" they retain
today. An emphasis on aesthetic beauty also developed—listeners were as
pleased with the physical appearance of an instrument as they were with
its sound. Therefore, builders paid special attention to materials and
workmanship, and instruments became collectibles in homes and museums.[91]
It was during this period that makers began constructing instruments of
the same type in various sizes to meet the demand of consorts, or
ensembles playing works written for these groups of instruments.[92]
Instrument builders developed other features that endure today. For
example, while organs with multiple keyboards and pedals already
existed, the first organs with
solo stops emerged in the early fifteenth century. These stops were
meant to produce a mixture of timbres, a development needed for the
complexity of music of the time.[93]
Trumpets evolved into their modern form to improve portability, and
players used
mutes to properly blend into
chamber music.[94]
Baroque
Beginning in the seventeenth century, composers began creating works
of a more emotional style. They felt that a
monophonic style better suited the emotional music and wrote musical
parts for instruments that would complement the singing human voice.[88]
As a result, many instruments that were incapable of larger ranges and
dynamics, and therefore were seen as unemotional, fell out of favor. One
such instrument was the shawm.[95]
Bowed instruments such as the violin,
viola,
baryton,
and various lutes dominated popular music.[96]
Beginning in around 1750, however, the lute disappeared from musical
compositions in favor of the rising popularity of the
guitar.[97]
As the prevalence of
string orchestras rose, wind instruments such as the flute, oboe,
and bassoon were readmitted to counteract the monotony of hearing only
strings.[98]
In the mid-seventeenth century, what was known as a hunter's horn
underwent transformation into an "art instrument" consisting of a
lengthened tube, a narrower bore, a wider bell, and much wider range.
The details of this transformation are unclear, but the modern
horn or, more colloquially, French horn, had emerged by 1725.[99]
The slide trumpet appeared, a variation that includes a long-throated
mouthpiece that slid in and out, allowing the player infinite
adjustments in
pitch. This variation on the trumpet was unpopular due to the
difficulty involved in playing it.[100]
Organs underwent tonal changes in the Baroque period, as manufacturers
such as Abraham Jordan of London made the stops more expressive and
added devices such as expressive pedals. Sachs viewed this trend as a
"degeneration" of the general organ sound.[101]
Classical and
Romantic
During the
Classical and
Romantic periods of music, lasting from roughly 1750 to 1900, a
great deal of musical instruments capable of producing new timbres and
higher volume were developed and introduced into popular music. The
design changes that broadened the quality of timbres allowed instruments
to produce a wider variety of expression. Large orchestras rose in
popularity and, in parallel, the composers determined to produce entire
orchestral scores that made use of the expressive abilities of modern
instruments. Since instruments were involved in collaborations of a much
larger scale, their designs had to evolve to accommodate the demands of
the orchestra.[102]
Some instruments also had to become louder to fill larger halls and
be heard over sizable orchestras. Flutes and bowed instruments underwent
many modifications and design changes—most of them unsuccessful—in
efforts to increase volume. Other instruments were changed just so they
could play their parts in the scores. Trumpets traditionally had a
"defective" range—they were incapable of producing certain notes with
precision.[103]
New instruments such as the clarinet, saxophone, and tuba became
fixtures in orchestras. Instruments such as the clarinet also grew into
entire "families" of instruments capable of different ranges: small
clarinets, normal clarinets, bass clarinets, and so on.[102]
Accompanying the changes to timbre and volume was a shift in the
typical pitch used to tune instruments. Instruments meant to play
together, as in an orchestra, must be tuned to the same standard lest
they produce audibly different sounds while playing the same notes.
Beginning in 1762, the average
concert pitch began rising from a low of 377 vibrations to a high of
457 in 1880 Vienna.[104]
Different regions, countries, and even instrument manufacturers
preferred different standards, making orchestral collaboration a
challenge. Despite even the efforts of two organized international
summits attended by noted composers like
Hector Berlioz, no standard could be agreed upon.[105]
Twentieth century to present
Headstock of a Fender Stratocaster electric guitar
The evolution of traditional musical instruments slowed beginning in
the twentieth century.[106]
Instruments like the violin, flute, french horn, harp, and so on are
largely the same as those manufactured throughout the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries. Gradual iterations do emerge; for example, the
"New Violin Family" began in 1964 to provide differently sized violins
to expand the range of available sounds.[107]
The slowdown in development was practical response to the concurrent
slowdown in orchestra and venue size.[108]
Despite this trend in traditional instruments, the development of new
musical instruments exploded in the twentieth century. The sheer variety
of instruments developed overshadows any prior period.[106]
The proliferation of electricity in the twentieth century lead to the
creation of an entirely new category of musical instruments: electronic
instruments, or
electrophones.[109]
The vast majority of electrophones produced in the first half of the
twentieth century were what Sachs called "electromechanical
instruments". In other words, they have mechanical parts that produce
sound vibrations, and those vibrations are picked up and amplified by
electrical components. Examples of electromechanical instruments include
organs and electric guitars.[109]
Sachs also defined a subcategory of "radioelectric instruments" such as
the
theremin, which produces music through the player's hand movements
around two antennas.[110]
The latter half of the twentieth century saw the gradual evolution of
synthesizers—instruments that artificially produce sound using
analog or digital circuits and microchips. In the late 1960s,
Bob Moog and other inventors began an era of development of
commercial synthesizers. One of the first of these instruments was the
Moog synthesizer.[111]
The modern proliferation of computers and microchips has spawned an
entire industry around electronic musical instruments. Since electronic
musical instruments may produce sound without human interaction, there
is debate in the modern music community as to whether or not computer
musicians may be considered instrumentalists.[citation
needed]
Classification
There are many different methods of classifying musical instruments.
Various methods examine aspects such as the physical properties of the
instrument (material, color, shape, etc.), the use for the instrument,
the means by which music is produced with the instrument, the
range of the instrument, and the instrument's place in an
orchestra or other ensemble. Most methods are specific to a
geographic area or cultural group and were developed to serve the unique
classification requirements of the group.[112]
The problem with these specialized classification schemes is that they
tend to break down once they are applied outside of their original area.
For example, a system based on instrument use would fail if a culture
invented a new use for the same instrument. Scholars recognize
Hornbostel-Sachs as the only system that applies to any culture and,
more important, provides only possible classification for each
instrument.[113][114]
Ancient systems
An ancient system named the
Natya Shastra, written by the sage
Bharata Muni and dating from between 200 BC and 200 AD, divides
instruments into four main classification groups: instruments where the
sound is produced by vibrating strings; percussion instruments with skin
heads; instruments where the sound is produced by vibrating columns of
air; and "solid", or non-skin, percussion instruments.[113]
This system was adapted to some degree in 12th-century Europe by
Johannes de Muris, who used the terms tensibilia (stringed
instruments), inflatibilia (wind instruments), and
percussibilia (all percussion instruments).[115]
In 1880,
Victor-Charles Mahillon adapted the Natya Shastra and assigned Greek
labels to the four classifications: chordophones (stringed
instruments), membranophones (skin-head percussion instruments),
aerophones (wind instruments), and autophones (non-skin
percussion instruments).[113]
Hornbostel-Sachs
Erich von Hornbostel and
Curt Sachs adopted Mahillon's scheme and published an extensive new
scheme for classification in Zeitschrift für Ethnologie in 1914.
Hornbostel and Sachs used most of Mahillon's system, but replaced the
term autophone with idiophone.[113]
The original Hornbostel-Sachs system classified instruments into four
main groups:
-
Idiophones, which produce sound by vibrating the primary body of
the instrument itself; they are sorted into concussion, percussion,
shaken, scraped, split, and plucked idiophones, such as
claves,
xylophone,
guiro,
slit drum,
mbira,
and
rattle.[116]
-
Membranophones, which produce sound by a vibrating a stretched
membrane; they may be
drums (further sorted by the shape of the shell), which are
struck by hand, with a stick, or rubbed, but
kazoos and other instruments that use a stretched membrane for
the primary sound (not simply to modify sound produced in another
way) are also considered membranophones.[117]
-
Chordophones, which produce sound by vibrating one or more
strings; they are sorted into according to the relationship between
the string(s) and the sounding board or chamber. For example, if the
strings are laid out parallel to the sounding board and there is no
neck, the instrument is a
zither
whether it is plucked like an
autoharp or struck with hammers like a
piano.
If the instrument has strings parallel to the sounding board or
chamber and the strings extend past the board with a neck, then the
instrument is a
lute,
whether the sound chamber is constructed of wood like a
guitar
or uses a membrane like a
banjo.[118]
-
Aerophones, which produce a sound by with a vibrating column of
air; they are sorted into free aerophones such as a
bullroarer or
whip,
which move freely through the air;
flutes, which cause the air to pass over a sharp edge; reed
instruments, which use a vibrating reed; and lip-vibrated aerophones
such as
trumpets, for which the lips themselves function as vibrating
reeds.[119]
Sachs later added a fifth category,
electrophones, such as
theremins, which produce sound by electronic means.[109]
Within each category are many subgroups. The system has been criticised
and revised over the years, but remains widely used by
ethnomusicologists and
organologists.[115][120]
Schaeffner
Andre Schaeffner, a curator at the
Musée de l'Homme, disagreed with the Hornbostel-Sachs system and
developed his own system in 1932. Schaeffner believed that the pure
physics of a musical instrument, rather than its specific construction
or playing method, should always determine its classification.
(Hornbostel-Sachs, for example, divide aerophones on the basis of sound
production, but membranophones on the basis of the shape of the
instrument). His system divided instruments into two categories:
instruments with solid, vibrating bodies and instruments containing
vibrating air.[121]
Range
Musical instruments are also often classified by their musical range
in comparison with other instruments in the same family. This exercise
is useful when placing instruments in context of an orchestra or other
ensemble.
These terms are named after singing voice classifications:
-
Soprano instruments:
flute,
violin,
soprano saxophone,
trumpet,
clarinet,
oboe,
piccolo
- Alto
instruments:
alto saxophone,
french horn,
english horn,
viola
- Tenor
instruments:
trombone,
tenor saxophone,
guitar,
tenor drum
-
Baritone instruments:
bassoon,
baritone saxophone,
bass clarinet,
cello,
baritone horn
-
Bass instruments:
double bass,
bass guitar,
bass saxophone,
tuba,
bass drum
Some instruments fall into more than one category: for example, the
cello may be considered tenor, baritone or bass, depending on how its
music fits into the ensemble, and the trombone may be alto, tenor,
baritone, or bass and the French horn, bass, baritone, tenor, or alto,
depending on the range it is played in. Many instruments have their
range as part of their name:
soprano saxophone,
tenor saxophone,
baritone horn,
alto flute,
bass guitar, etc. Additional adjectives describe instruments above
the soprano range or
below the bass, for example:
sopranino saxophone,
contrabass clarinet. When used in the name of an instrument, these
terms are relative, describing the instrument's range in comparison to
other instruments of its family and not in comparison to the human voice
range or instruments of other families. For example, a bass flute's
range is from C3 to F♯6, while a bass clarinet
plays about one octave lower.
Construction
The materials used in making musical instruments vary greatly by
culture and application. Many of the materials have special significance
owing to their source or rarity. Some cultures worked substances from
the human body into their instruments. In ancient Mexico, for example,
the material drums were made from might contain actual human body parts
obtained from sacrificial offerings. In New Guinea, drum makers would
mix human blood into the adhesive used to attach the
membrane.[122]
Mulberry trees are held in high regard in China owing to their
mythological significance—instrument makers would hence use them to make
zithers. The
Yakuts
believe that making drums from trees struck by lightning gives them a
special connection to nature.[123]
Musical instrument construction is a specialized trade that requires
years of training, practice, and sometimes an apprenticeship. Most
makers of musical instruments specialize in one genre of instruments;
for example, a
luthier
makes only stringed instruments. Some make only one type of instrument
such as a piano. Whatever the instrument constructed, the instrument
maker must consider materials, construction technique, and decoration,
creating a balanced instrument that is both functional and aesthetically
pleasing.[124]
Some builders are focused on a more artistic approach and develop
experimental musical instruments, often meant for individual playing
styles developed by the builder himself.
User interfaces
Regardless of how the sound in an instrument is produced, many
musical instruments have a keyboard as the user-interface.
Keyboard instruments are any instruments that are played with a
musical keyboard. Every key generates one or more sounds; most
keyboard instruments have extra means (pedals
for a piano,
stops for an organ) to manipulate these sounds. They may produce
sound by wind being fanned (organ)
or pumped (accordion),[125][126]
vibrating strings either hammered (piano)
or plucked (harpsichord),[127][128]
by electronic means (synthesizer),[129]
or in some other way. Sometimes, instruments that do not usually have a
keyboard, such as the
glockenspiel, are fitted with one.[130]
Though they have no moving parts and are struck by mallets held in the
player's hands, they have the same physical arrangement of keys and
produce soundwaves in a similar manner.
See also
Notes
-
^
Montagu 2007, pp. 1
- ^
a
b
c
Rault 2000, pp. 9
- ^
a
b
Blades 1992, pp. 34
-
^
Slovenian Academy of Sciences 1997, pp. 203–205
-
^
Chase and Nowell 1998, pp. 549
-
^
CBC Arts 2004
-
^
Collinson 1975, pp. 10
- ^
a
b
Campbell 2004, pp. 82
-
^
de Schauensee 2002, pp. 1–16
-
^
Moorey 1977, pp. 24–40
- ^
a
b
"Brookhaven Lab Expert Helps Date Flute Thought to be Oldest
Playable Musical Instrument".
Brookhaven National Laboratory.
Retrieved 10 February 2011.
-
^
"Jiahu (ca. 7000–5700 B.C.)". The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Retrieved 10 February 2011.
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 60
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 61
-
^
Brown 2008
-
^
Baines 1993, p. 37
- ^
a
b
Sachs 1940, p. 63
- ^
a
b
Sachs 1940, p. 297
-
^
Blades 1992, pp. 36
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 26
-
^
Rault 2000, pp. 34
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 34–52
-
^
Blades 1992, pp. 51
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 35
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 52–53
-
^
Marcuse 1975, pp. 24–28
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 53–59
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 67
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 68–69
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 69
-
^
Remnant 1989, p. 168
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 70
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 82
- ^
a
b
c
Sachs 1940, p. 86
-
^
Rault 2000, pp. 71
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 98–104
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 105
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 106
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 108–113
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 114
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 116
-
^
Marcuse 1975, p. 385
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 128
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 129
-
^
Campbell 2004, p. 83
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 149
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 151
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 152
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 161
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 185
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 162–164
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 166
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 178
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 189
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 192
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 196–201
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 207
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 218
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 216
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 221
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 222
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 222–228
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 229
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 231
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 236
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 238–239
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 240
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 246
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 249
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 250
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 251–254
- ^
a
b
Sachs 1940, p. 260
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 263
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 265
-
^
Kartomi 1990, p. 124
-
^
Grillet 1901, p. 29
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 269
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 271
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 274
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 273
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 278
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 281
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 284
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 286
-
^
Bicknell 1999, p. 13
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 288
- ^
a
b
Sachs 1940, p. 298
- ^
a
b
Sachs 1940, p. 351
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 299
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 301
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 302
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 303
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 307
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 328
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 352
-
^
Sachs 1940, pp. 353–357
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 374
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 380
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 384
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 385
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 386
- ^
a
b
Sachs 1940, p. 388
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 389
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 390
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 391
-
^
a
b
Remnant 1989, p. 183
-
^
Remnant 1989, p. 70
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 445
- ^
a
b
c
Sachs 1940, p. 447
-
^
Sachs 1940, p. 448
-
^
Pinch and Trocco 2004, p. 7
-
^
Montagu 2007, p. 210
-
^
a
b
c
d
Montagu 2007, p. 211
-
^
Kartomi 1990, p. 176
- ^
a
b
Rault 2000, pp. 190
-
^
Marcuse 1975, p. 3
-
^
Marcuse 1975, p. 117
-
^
Marcuse 1975, p. 177
-
^
Marcuse 1975, p. 549
-
^
Campbell 2004, pp. 39
-
^
Kartomi 1990, pp. 174–175
-
^
Rault 2000, pp. 184
-
^
Rault 2000, pp. 185
-
^
Rault 2000, pp. 195
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^ Bicknell, Stephen
(1999). "The organ case". In Thistlethwaite, Nicholas & Webber,
Geoffrey (Eds.), The Cambridge Companion to the Organ, pp.
55–81. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
ISBN 0-521-57584-2
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^ Howard, Rob (2003)
An A to Z of the Accordion and related instruments Stockport:
Robaccord Publications
ISBN 0-9546711-0-4
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^ Fine, Larry. The
Piano Book, 4th ed. Massachusetts: Brookside Press, 2001.
ISBN 1-929145-01-2
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^ Ripin (Ed) et al.
Early Keyboard Instruments. New Grove Musical Instruments
Series, 1989, PAPERMAC
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^ Paradiso, JA.
"Electronic music: new ways to play". Spectrum IEEE,
34(2):18–33, Dec 1997.
-
^
"Glockenspiel: Construction". Vienna Symphonic Library.
Retrieved 17 August 2009.
References
- Baines, Anthony
(1993), Brass Instruments: Their History and Development,
Dover Publications,
ISBN 0-486-27574-4
- Bicknell,
Stephen (1999), The History of the English Organ, Cambridge
University Press,
ISBN 0-521-65409-2
- Blades, James
(1992), Percussion Instruments and Their History, Bold
Strummer Ltd,
ISBN 0-933224-61-3
- Brown, Howard Mayer
(2008),
Sachs, Curt, Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians,
retrieved 5 June 2008
-
Campbell, Murray; Greated, Clive A.; Myers, Arnold (2004),
Musical Instruments: History, Technology, and Performance of
Instruments of Western Music, Oxford University Press,
ISBN 0-19-816504-8
-
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (December 30, 2004),
Archeologists discover ice age dwellers' flute, Canadian
Broadcasting Corporation,
retrieved 7 February 2009[dead
link]
- Chase, Philip
G.; Nowell, April (Aug–Oct 1998), "Taphonomy of a Suggested Middle
Paleolithic Bone Flute from Slovenia", Current Anthropology
39 (4): 549,
doi:10.1086/204771
- Collinson,
Francis M. (1975), The Bagpipe, Routledge,
ISBN 0-7100-7913-3
- de
Schauensee, Maude (2002), Two Lyres from Ur, University of
Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology,
ISBN 0-924171-88-X
- Grillet, Laurent
(1901), Les ancetres du violon v.1, Paris
- Kartomi, Margaret
J. (1990), On Concepts and Classifications of Musical Instruments,
University of Chicago Press,
ISBN 0-226-42548-7
- Marcuse, Sibyl
(1975), A Survey of Musical Instruments, Harper & Row,
ISBN 0-06-012776-7
- Montagu, Jeremy
(2007), Origins and Development of Musical Instruments, The
Scarecrow Press,
ISBN 0-8108-5657-3
- Moorey, P.R.S.
(1977), "What Do We Know About the People Buried in the Royal
Cemetery?", Expedition 20 (1): 24–40
- Pinch, Revor;
Trocco, Frank (2004), Analog Days: The Invention and Impact of
the Moog Synthesizer, Harvard University Press,
ISBN 978-0-674-01617-0
- Rault, Lucie
(2000), Musical Instruments: A Worldwide Survey of Traditional
Music-making, Thames & Hudson Ltd,
ISBN 978-0-500-51035-3
- Remnant, Mary
(1989), Musical Instruments: An Illustrated History from
Antiquity to the Present, Batsford,
ISBN 0-7134-5169-6.
- Sachs, Curt (1940),
The History of Musical Instruments, Dover Publications,
ISBN 0-486-45265-4
-
Slovenian Academy of Sciences (April 11, 1997), "Early Music",
Science 276 (5310): 203–205,
doi:10.1126/science.276.5310.203g
- West, M.L. (May
1994), "The Babylonian Musical Notation and the Hurrian Melodic
Texts", Music & Letters 75 (2): 161–179,
doi:10.1093/ml/75.2.161
Further reading
-
Wade-Matthews, Max (2003), Musical Instruments: Illustrated
Encyclopedia, Lorenz,
ISBN 0-7548-1182-4
- Music Library Association (1974). Committee on Musical
Instrument Collections. A Survey of Musical Instrument Collections
in the United States and Canada, conducted by a committee of the
Music Library Association, William Lichtenwanger, chairman &
compiler, ed. and produced by James W. Pruitt. Ann Arbor, Mich.:
Music Library Association. xi, 137 p.
ISBN 0-914954-00-8
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