SEARCH RESULTS FOR: double%20harp
1 of 16 Pages     Next ›

The double bass is the only survivor from the viol family to have found a regular place in the orchestra. Like other members of the viol family, it initially carried frets – tiny knotted pieces of gut that measured out the fingerboard. As it was adopted into the violin family, it settled down as a four-stringed instrument, shed ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

During the sixteenth century the harp was in danger of falling into disuse as chromatic keyboards raised composers’ expectations of what plucked strings could achieve. But in the third quarter of the century, instrument-builders began to experiment with the double harp, constructed with a second row of strings running next to the first. Arrangements of strings varied as makers ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

At its simplest, to make a double reed the end of a piece of reed or similar plant tube is flattened so its sides nearly touch. Putting this flattened end into the mouth and blowing causes the two sides to briefly close against each other then spring back, hundreds of times a second. This causes a regular stream of ...

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

Contemporary music whose ancestry lies in the Western classical tradition finds itself in a curious position. Nothing illustrates this better than the fact that we are not entirely sure what to call it. The label ‘classical’ seems anachronistic, especially when applied to composers who have challenged some of the fundamental assumptions of the classical tradition. ‘Concert music’ is similarly problematic ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

Gamelan is an orchestral tradition in Java and Bali, where every instrument – various gongs and drums – is a member of the percussion family. The tradition emphasizes respect for the instruments and cooperation between the players. In 1887, the Paris Conservatoire acquired a gamelan. In 1889, Debussy went to the Paris Exhibition, where he heard the ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

During the first years of the nineteenth century piano technology progressed at an astonishing rate. The range of notes was extended by two and a half octaves, the sustaining pedal and soundboard were developed, and in England the idea of using metal bracing to bear the tension of the strings was explored, enabling thicker strings and a fuller ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

By the early nineteenth century, the orchestra was fairly standardized: strings, divided into first and second violins (typically about 16 each in a full-size group), violas (12), cellos (12) and double basses (8); woodwind, consisting of two each of flutes, oboes, clarinets and bassoons; and brass, usually two or four horns, two trumpets, ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band started out in 1966 as a student jug band in Los Angeles, and in an early incarnation it included a teenage Jackson Browne. Among the group’s founder members was singer and guitarist Jeff Hanna. Both Hanna and multi-instrumentalist Jimmie Fadden are still Dirt Band members 40 years on. The extremely ambitious Will The Circle Be ...

Source: The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Country Music, consultant editor Bob Allen

A bowed string instrument, the arpeggione was invented in Vienna by J. G. Stauffer in 1823–24. A kind of bass viol, with soundholes like a viol, it is waisted, but shaped more like a large guitar than a viol or double bass. Six-stringed and with metal frets, it was tuned E, A, d, ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

The bagpipe principle is simple: instead of the player blowing directly on a reed pipe, the air is supplied from a reservoir, usually made of animal skin, which is inflated either by mouth or by bellows. The result is the ability to produce a continuous tone, and the possibility of adding extra reed-pipes to enable a single ...

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

Like the snare drum and tenor drum, the bass drum originated in the Middle East. It is a large instrument with a cylindrical body and two heads, and is the drum used to keep the rhythm in marching bands. The modern orchestral bass drum (100 cm/70 in diameter and 50 cm/20 in long) is double headed and rod tensioned. ...

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

Attempts were made in the nineteenth century to turn the bassoon into a metal instrument: Charles and Adolphe Sax experimented with brass bassoons and the latter patented such an instrument, with 24 keys, in 1851. There were rival arrangements of keys (which implied different ways of fingering) available in the nineteenth century. There continue to be French and German ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie

As ensemble music became more popular during the sixteenth century there was increased demand for wind instruments that could elegantly negotiate the lower ranges. Large versions of wind instruments intended for the higher registers lacked volume and agility and were often difficult to play. Various elements of existing instruments – the bass recorder’s crook and the shawm’s double reed, for ...

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

Bugle Best known in its military guise, the bugle is one of the simplest of brass instruments in terms of construction, but it is very difficult to play. The single tube of metal has no valves to help create different notes, so players have to do all the work by changing their embouchure – a combination of the ...

Source: The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Music, general editor Paul Du Noyer

Originally (and still occasionally) known as the ‘violoncello’, or ‘little violone’, the cello is tuned in fifths like the violin and viola, running bottom to top, C, G, d, a, the same tuning as a viola, but an octave lower. There were early experiments with a smaller five-stringed instrument (with an additional E string ...

Source: Classical Music Encyclopedia, founding editor Stanley Sadie
1 of 16 Pages     Next ›

AUTHORITATIVE

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...

CURATED

Classical, Rock, Blues, Jazz, Country and more. Flame Tree has been making encyclopaedias and guides about music for over 20 years. Now Flame Tree Pro brings together a huge canon of carefully curated information on genres, styles, artists and instruments. It's a perfect tool for study, and entertaining too, a great companion to our music books.

Rock, A Life Story

Rock, A Life Story

The ultimate story of a life of rock music, from the 1950s to the present day.

David Bowie

David Bowie

Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers his life, music, art and movies, with a sweep of incredible photographs.