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(Production team/rhythm section, 1975–present) Sly Dunbar (drums) and Robbie Shakespeare (bass) both worked for various reggae artists, including Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry, before coming together at Kingston’s Channel One Studio in the mid-1970s, where their innovative, but funky combination powered the new ‘rockers’ sound. They backed practically every Jamaican artist of note, from Peter Tosh to ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, general editor Michael Heatley

The story of Sly Stone (born Sylvester Stewart in Dallas on 15 March 1944) is a classic rock’n’roll tale of ground-breaking success followed by a drug-fuelled downward spiral into unreliability and dissipation. In the 1960s and early 1970s he pioneered a fusion of funk, rock and soul that changed the course of R&B, pop and even jazz. Yet on ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock, general editor Michael Heatley

On the face of it, barrels and music would seem unlikely bedfellows. Their alliance, however, goes back at least to the ninth century, when the first detailed description of a barrel organ appeared in an Arab treatise. Mechanics of the Barrel Organ The mechanical principle underlying all such instruments, from the automated organ and piano to ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

During the 1830s, Mexican cattle-herders introduced the guitar to Hawaiians, who quickly incorporated it into their own music-making, typically tuning all the strings to the notes of a major triad. Joseph Kekuku is credited with developing a technique of using a comb to slide up and down the neck to create glissandi. Clearly this was difficult to achieve ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

A musical ensemble is a group of two or more musicians who have come together to play music. In theory, an ensemble could contain any number of instruments in any combination, but in practice, certain combinations just don’t work very well, either for musical reasons or because of the sheer practicality of getting particular instruments and players ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

In one form or another, the harpsichord ruled the domestic keyboard roost throughout Europe – and later in America – from the late-sixteenth to the early-nineteenth centuries. Apart from the organ, it was the grandest and most versatile of all keyboard instruments until the advent of the mature fortepiano in the mid- to late-eighteenth century. Rise and Fall of ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

Sound effects and instruments trouvés include found objects and specialist machines for making noises. Composers have made extensive use of both sound effects and found objects in orchestral music, especially in music for theatre, dance and opera. Sound Effects The wind machine was originally a theatrical sound effect, and is a cylinder of wooden slats with a canvas ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

A range of metal percussion instruments are found in the western orchestra, many of which have ancient and global origins. Triangle The triangle comprises a slim steel bar, circular in cross-section, bent into an equilateral triangle (18 cm/7 in each side) with one corner open. It is played with a metal rod, and is suspended from a ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

In 1905, and probably for several decades before that, there were more pianos in the United States than there were bathtubs. In Europe, throughout the nineteenth century, piano sales increased at a greater rate than the population. English, French and German makers dispatched veritable armies of pianos to every corner of the Earth. It was the ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

Like the synthesizer, the sampler has had a huge influence on the course of electronic music. A sampler is an instrument that can record, store and replay brief sections of audio – ‘samples’. In many ways, the Mellotron might be regarded as the earliest example of a sampling instrument. However, the sampler really came into its own ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

The saxophone occupies an unusual position in that it is a bespoke instrument that has barely changed since its creation. Although it does not occupy the position in the orchestra its creator had envisaged, Adolphe Sax’s invention has played a central part in music ever since it burst on to the scene in the 1840s. Sax’s father, Charles, ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

A trombone is a brass instrument sounded by buzzing the lips into a mouthpiece. It is peculiar amongst brass instruments in using a double ‘U’-shaped slide to alter its pitch. The early history of the trombone is confused, mostly due to a lack of clarity in naming instruments. It is generally accepted that the immediate precursor to the trombone was ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

The trumpet is one of the most ancient instruments still played today. Clear depictions of trumpets survive in Egyptian paintings and two trumpets – one of silver, the other of gold and brass – found in the tomb of Tutankhamun date back to at least 1350 BC. There are many examples of Roman and Greek trumpets which, like the ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins

The basic construction of the violin, with its waisted or figure-of-eight body (with a hard-wood back, usually maple, and a softer front, usually spruce), was established early in the sixteenth century. The strings (tuned, from the top downwards, as E, A, D and G) run from a peg box, where tension can ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

The violin family is a group of fretless bowed stringed instruments that has its roots in Italy. Four instruments make up the family: the violin, the viola, the violoncello (commonly abbreviated to cello), and the double bass. The characteristic body shape is one of the most recognizable in music; the particular acoustic properties this shape imparts have made the ...

Source: The Illustrated Complete Musical Instruments Handbook, general editor Lucien Jenkins
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An extensive music information resource, bringing together the talents and expertise of a wide range of editors and musicologists, including Stanley Sadie, Charles Wilson, Paul Du Noyer, Tony Byworth, Bob Allen, Howard Mandel, Cliff Douse, William Schafer, John Wilson...

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