Starting with a design that is nearly four hundred years old, the violin maker selects just the right pieces of wood from his storeroom. Each part of the instrument will be made from a special kind of wood, and he chooses pieces of spruce, maple, pine, ebony, or Pernambuco wood with which to work.

For the next three or four months the instrument maker will carve, shape, and fit these pieces of wood together like a puzzle. As he finishes each of the nearly seventy different parts, it will be fitted in the proper place. Some parts will be glued, others will be held in the proper position by being fitted just right, (More…)

dodoString Instruments, Violin7 Oct, 20082 Comments

Even though the tone of the trumpet is very brilliant, it is capable of playing beautiful melodies. When its sound is blended with that of other instruments, new and exciting sounds are created. As with all brass instruments, the tone of the trumpet can be altered by placing a mute in the bell. This is a cone-shaped device usually made of metal or fibreboard. A muted trumpet has a soft, faraway sound and is often used to represent an echo of the sounds of other instruments. (More…)

dodoBrass, Jazz, Music Equipments, Trumpet3 Oct, 20082 Comments

Thousands of years ago man discovered that by boring a hole in the side of an animal horn and forcing air through the opening, he could produce sounds that were useful in sending messages short distances. The sound was generated by the player’s either buzzing his lips into the small opening or by blowing across the opening as you would blow across the top of a Coke bottle. The horn then amplified the sound and made it loud enough to be heard some distance away. (More…)

dodoBass Guitar, Brass, Classical Music, Music Box, Musical Instruments, Trumpet3 Oct, 20082 Comments

The double-reed family of woodwinds consists of the oboe, English horn, bassoon, and contrabassoon. Each has a double reed made of cane that the player holds between his lips and blows air through, just as you did earlier with the paper drinking straw.

There have been many types of double-reed instruments throughout history. Imported to Europe from the Orient, they have rather strange names such as bombarde, pommer, schryari, krummhorn, and rackett. It was during the seventeenth century that these instruments began taking on the appearance and sound of our modern instruments. (More…)

dodoMusic Equipments, Music Genres, Musical Instruments, Woodwinds1 Oct, 20082 Comments

All the instruments of the flute family are very similar. Their sound is produced by a vibrating air column, they are all fingered the same way, and they are made from metal. Although it is a small family and the instruments can’t play very loudly, the flute family has an important place in both our musical heritage and the music of today.

Instruments of the clarinet family are perhaps the most versatile and useful of the woodwinds. Descendants of a family of seventeenth-century instruments called shawms, shalmeys, or chalumeaux, their sounds are produced by blowing air across a single reed. (More…)

dodoJazz, Popular Music, Saxophone, Violin, Woodwinds1 Oct, 20082 Comments

The part for the trumpet is written on the stave immediately below that of the horns. Whether it is written for as it actually sounds or as a transposing instrument depends on the period of the music, the pitch of the trumpet and on the habit or preference of the composer.

The burnished physical appearance and the sound of this looped and narrow bore instrument are familiar and not likely to be confused with the shorter and wider cornet, because the cornet’s less noble tones are not often heard in the symphony orchestra (although Franck included it in his symphony). (More…)

dodoBrass, Classical Music, Trumpet14 Aug, 20085 Comments

The part for the tuba is written on the bass clef, under the stave carrying the part for the trombone. The tuba is not a transposing instrument, but should the part for the bass tuba go very low the sign 8va is used, obviating ledger lines and indicating that the music is to sound an octave lower than written. (More…)

dodoBrass, Classical Music, Electric Guitar, Guitar, Music Box, Music Equipments, Musical Instruments, Trumpet, Violin11 Aug, 20083 Comments

The part for the timpani, or kettle drums, is written on a stave above that of the first stringed instrument, be it harp, violins, or that other percussion instrument, the piano. The notes to which the two or three drums are to be tuned are named at the beginning of the score, any alterations being indicated as they occur. Each drum has a compass of a fifth. (More…)

dodoDrums, Percussion Instruments, Piano, Trumpet, Violin9 Aug, 20086 Comments

The harpsichord has a shallower cabinet than that of the piano, and the legs are prettier. If historical accuracy has been observed in its making it will have no foot pedals but instead hand stops placed in the right and the left of the keyboard. Very likely there will be two manuals or keyboards which are stepped. Harpsichordists sit very still as they play. As the strings are plucked by means of tiny quills, no additional volume is to be gained by exerting force or using arm weight. Only a rapid, almost plucking action of the fingers is necessary. No changes of volume are possible, but alterations of timbre are, and these are achieved by a combination of the hand stops. The hand stops engage additional ranks of strings, or alter the point at which they are plucked. The number of ranks of strings and hand stops vary according to the date and make of the instrument. (More…)

dodoPiano31 Jul, 20084 Comments

The piano is rarely used as an instrument of the orchestra, but when it is the part is written in the score between the percussion and strings. The piano is a percussion instrument since the strings are struck by hammers.

Today the piano is the heaviest of all musical instruments, the cabinet being uniformly sombre in colour and the several legs of muscular appearance on account of the weight they have to bear.Unlike any other instrument of the orchestra the name of the maker could sometimes be read by the audience because it used to be announced in large letters. (More…)

dodoClassical Music, Drums, Music Box, Music Equipments, Percussion Instruments, Piano26 Jul, 20084 Comments