Drum’n’bass was a kind of re-branding that came from the scene itself – the producer side that wanted to allow filmic sounds to speak for them rather than some patois MC. By downplaying the ragga, producers and DJs were effectively saying that they wished to communicate a message or mood sonically rather than verbally. Some have argued that drum’n’bass is ...
Commonly pitched in B flat like the standard orchestral clarinet, but sounding an octave below it, the bass clarinet began life as an eighteenth-century instrument that looked faintly like a dulcian, though with an upward-pointing bell. Adolphe Sax (1814–94) and L. A. Buffet (fl. 1839–43) both worked on the instrument in the nineteenth century. Sax developed one with ...
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. ...
The invention of valves meant that brass instruments could now explore the bass register, and soon after 1835 bass tubas started being manufactured in Germany. Essentially a keyed bugle by descent, the bass tuba (confusingly, the name tuba comes from the Latin word for trumpet) has a very wide conical bore and as a result requires a good ...
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 ...
The drum kit is a collection of drums and cymbals played in all styles of rock, pop, jazz and blues. It is also widely used in urban music across the world, such as Afrobeat and reggae. Drum-Kit Construction A typical drum kit comprises a bass drum and hi-hat cymbal played with foot pedals, a snare drum, ...
A drum machine is an instrument that uses synthesized or sampled sound to emulate drums or other percussion, and allows the user to programme rhythmic patterns that can be chained together into songs. Rhythm Machines The history of the drum machine dates back as far as the 1930s, when Leon Theremin (1896–1993) was commissioned by composer Henry Cowell (1897–1965) ...
The electric bass is similar in both appearance and operation to the electric guitar, but is actually a descendent of the upright acoustic double bass. The double bass had long been an integral part of the jazz rhythm section, but the increasing need to compete with amplified instruments – not to mention the transportation problems caused by its sheer ...
The drum is perhaps the oldest instrument known to man. Drummers have always sought increasingly sophisticated ways of refining their art and gaining access to as broad a palette of sounds as possible and, in many instances, have embraced the electronic revolution as enthusiastically as their keyboard-playing counterparts. Early Electronic Drums Early electronic drum systems included the Electro-Harmonix Space ...
A frame drum is a skin stretched over and nailed to a shallow square or circular frame. It is played with sticks or with the hands. Frame drums are common to many musical cultures, and the modern tambourine and bodhrán are essentially the same instruments that were being played in Arabia and India in pre-Islamic times. They are often played ...
Friction drums are folk instruments of pre-industrialized Central Europe, Africa and Latin America. They are often associated with spiritual music because of their unusual sound. Construction A friction drum comprises a vessel covered in a membrane which is made to vibrate by means of a stick or string rubbed against or pushed through it. In the Brazilian cuíca, the ...
Slit drums, or log drums, are found in many pre-industrialized cultures in Africa, Australasia, Central and South America, and the Far East. They are formed by hollowing a block of wood through a lengthwise slit, and are sounded by the players’ stamping feet or by being beaten with sticks. Slit drums are really idiophones as ...
The snare drum and tenor drum both originated in the Middle East. Today, cylindrical drums like these are played in western classical music, and in pop, rock and jazz. They appear in marching and military bands, in the orchestra and as part of the drum kit. Cylindrical Drums The body of a cylindrical drum is usually made ...
The snare drum is cylindrical. It has a wooden or metal frame with parchment stretched across either end. Stretched across the lower of these is a metal ‘snare’ which rattles when the drum is beaten. Another name for snare drums is ‘side drums’ because they were carried at the hip by army drummers. Snare drums are often used in Handel’s Music for ...
String drums are simple string instruments that are struck in a technique similar to playing the violin col legno (literally ‘with the wood’) or battuta (measuring time by beating). They are traditional instruments of Hungary and the Balkans. Ttun ttun The ttun ttun is a Basque instrument constructed from a tapered hollow wooden case that is 11 cm (4 in) wide at ...
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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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David Bowie
Fantastic new, unofficial biography covers
his life, music, art and movies, with a
sweep of incredible photographs.