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Idiophones Struck Directly
An idiophone is any musical instrument that creates sound primarily by the vibration of the instrument itself, without the use of air flow (as with aerophones), strings (chordophones), membranes (membranophones) or electricity (electrophones). It is the first of the four main divisions in the original Hornbostel–Sachs system of musical instrument classification (see List of idiophones by Hornbostel–Sachs number). The early classification of Victor-Charles Mahillon called this group of instruments ''autophones''. The most common are struck idiophones, or concussion idiophones, which are made to vibrate by being struck, either directly with a stick or hand (like the wood block, singing bowl, steel tongue drum, handpan, triangle or marimba) or indirectly, with scraping or shaking motions (like maracas or flexatone). Various types of bells fall into both categories. A common plucked idiophone is the Jew's harp. According to Sachs, idiophones Etymology The word is from Anci ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ideophone
An ideophone (also known as a mimetic or expressive) is a member of the word class of words that depict sensory imagery or sensations, evoking ideas of action, sound, movement, color, or shape. The class of ideophones is the least common syntactic category cross-linguistically; it occurs mostly in African, Australian, and Amerindian languages, and sporadically elsewhere. Ideophones resemble interjections but are different owing to their special phonetic or derivational characteristics, and based on their syntactic function within the sentence. They may include sounds that deviate from the language's phonological system, imitating—often in a repetitive manner—sounds of movement, animal noises, bodily sounds, noises made by tools or machines, and the like. It is globally the only known word class that does not appear in English. While English does have ideophonic or onomatopoetic expressions, it does not contain a proper class of ideophones because any English onomatopoe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Steel Tongue Drum
A steel tongue drum, tank drum, or hank drum is a round steel slit/tongue drum in the idiophone family originally fashioned from a propane cylinder. Description A steel tongue drum can be made from an empty, often 20-lb (9-kg) propane tank. The tank is flipped over and the base is cut or knocked off. Seven to ten tongues are then cut radially into the bottom of the tank, forming the top of the instrument. A steel tongue drum can also be made from a new unused tank head. The tongues can be tuned by the maker by varying the length of the cuts, or by adding weights, often neodymium magnets, to the tongues. Although steel tongue drums are often tuned to pentatonic scales, they can also be tuned to the diatonic scale, the chromatic scale, or any set of notes the maker chooses. The instrument is played with the fingers or with mallets. It boasts a pleasant, bell-like tone. History The steel tongue drum is based on the wooden slit drum. The slit drum is known to have been developed i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kouxian
''Kouxian'' () is a general Chinese term for any variety of jaw harp. The jaw harp is a plucked idiophone in which the lamella is mounted in a small frame, and the player's open mouth serves as a resonance chamber. Chinese jaw harps may comprise multiple idiophones that are lashed together at one end and spread in a fan formation. They may be made from bamboo or a metal alloy, such as brass.Li, Yongxiang. The Music of China's Ethnic Minorities'. Taiwan, China Intercontinental Press, 2006. 2. Modern ''kouxian'' with three or more idiophones might be tuned to the first few tones of the minor pentatonic scale. The jaw harp likely originated in Asia. Although played throughout China, it is particularly popular among the non- Han ethnic groups of Southwest China, such as those in Yunnan, Guangxi, and Guizhou. The varieties of Chinese have numerous vernacular Vernacular is the ordinary, informal, spoken language, spoken form of language, particularly when perceptual diale ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Amplified Cactus
Live plants have been used as musical instruments, especially in electronic music. Live plants can be used as electronic musical instrument by running a weak electric current through them and by amplifying the way the current is changed when the plants are touched, or by applying contact microphones and amplifying the projection and tone of the sounds produced when handling them. John Cage John Milton Cage Jr. (September 5, 1912 – August 12, 1992) was an American composer and music theorist. A pioneer of indeterminacy in music, electroacoustic music, and Extended technique, non-standard use of musical instruments, Cage was one ... composed ''Child of Tree'' (1975) and ''Branches'' (1976) for what he described as "amplified plant materials". Cage was a proponent of chance music and felt that the organic nature of music without man-made instruments was very strong and influential. The percussion group So Percussion gave a concert in 2007 featuring Cage's pieces, where perc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jew's Harp
The Jew's harp, also known as jaw harp, juice harp, or mouth harp, is a lamellophone instrument, consisting of a flexible metal or bamboo tongue or reed attached to a frame. Despite the colloquial name, the Jew's harp most likely originated in China, with the earliest known Jew's harps dating back 4,000 years ago from Shaanxi province. It has no relation to the Jewish people. Jew's harps may be categorized as idioglot or heteroglot (whether or not the frame and the tine are one piece); by the shape of the frame (rod or plaque); by the number of tines, and whether the tines are plucked, joint-tapped, or string-pulled. Characteristics The frame is held firmly against the performer's parted teeth or lips (depending on the type), using the mouth (plus the throat and lungs when breathing freely) as a resonator, greatly increasing the volume of the instrument. The teeth must be parted sufficiently for the reed to vibrate freely, and the fleshy parts of the mouth should not come into ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Drum
The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a shell and struck, either directly with the player's hands, or with a percussion mallet, to produce sound. There is usually a resonant head on the underside of the drum. Other techniques have been used to cause drums to make sound, such as the thumb roll. Drums are the world's oldest and most ubiquitous musical instruments, and the basic design has remained virtually unchanged for thousands of years. Drums may be played individually, with the player using a single drum, and some drums such as the djembe are almost always played in this way. Others are normally played in a set of two or more, all played by one player, such as bongo drums and timpani. A number of different drums together with cymbals form the basic modern drum kit. Many ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Percussion Instrument
A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a percussion mallet, beater including attached or enclosed beaters or Rattle (percussion beater), rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Excluding Zoomusicology, zoomusicological instruments and the human voice, the percussion family is believed to include the oldest musical instruments.''The Oxford Companion to Music'', 10th edition, p.775, In spite of being a very common term to designate instruments, and to relate them to their players, the percussionists, percussion is not a systematic classificatory category of instruments, as described by the scientific field of organology. It is shown below that percussion instruments may belong to the organological classes of idiophone, membranophone, aerophone and String instrument, chordophone. The percussion section of an orchestra most commonly contains instruments such as the timpani, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Curt Sachs
Curt Sachs (; 29 June 1881 – 5 February 1959) was a German musicologist. He was one of the founders of modern organology (the study of musical instruments). Among his contributions was the Hornbostel–Sachs system, which he created with Erich von Hornbostel. Biography Born in Berlin, Sachs studied piano, music theory and composition as a youth in that city. However, his doctorate from Berlin University (where he was later professor of musicology) in 1904 was on the history of art, with his thesis on the sculpture of Verrocchio. He began a career as an art historian, but promptly became more devoted to music, eventually being appointed director of the Staatliche Instrumentensammlung, a large collection of musical instruments. He reorganised and restored much of the collection, and his career as an organologist began. In 1913, Sachs saw the publication of his book ''Real-Lexicon der Musikinstrumente'', probably the most comprehensive survey of musical instruments in 200 yea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jaw Harp
The Jew's harp, also known as jaw harp, juice harp, or mouth harp, is a lamellophone instrument, consisting of a flexible metal or bamboo tongue or Reed (mouthpiece), reed attached to a frame. Despite the colloquial name, the Jew's harp most likely originated in China, with the earliest known Jew's harps dating back 4,000 years ago from Shaanxi, Shaanxi province. It has no relation to the Jewish people. Jew's harps may be categorized as idioglot or heteroglot (whether or not the frame and the tine are one piece); by the shape of the frame (rod or plaque); by the number of tines, and whether the tines are plucked, joint-tapped, or string-pulled. Characteristics The frame is held firmly against the performer's parted teeth or lips (depending on the type), using the mouth (plus the throat and lungs when breathing freely) as a Resonator#Acoustic, resonator, greatly increasing the volume of the instrument. The teeth must be parted sufficiently for the reed to vibrate freely, and the f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bell (instrument)
A bell /ˈbɛl/ () is a directly struck idiophone percussion instrument. Most bells have the shape of a hollow cup that when struck vibrates in a single strong strike tone, with its sides forming an efficient resonator. The strike may be made by an internal "clapper" or "uvula", an external hammer, or—in small bells—by a small loose sphere enclosed within the body of the bell ( jingle bell). Bells are usually cast from bell metal (a type of bronze) for its resonant properties, but can also be made from other hard materials. This depends on the function. Some small bells such as ornamental bells or cowbells can be made from cast or pressed metal, glass or ceramic, but large bells such as a church, clock and tower bells are normally cast from bell metal. Bells intended to be heard over a wide area can range from a single bell hung in a turret or bell-gable, to a musical ensemble such as an English ring of bells, a carillon or a Russian zvon which are tuned to a common ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flexatone
The flexatone or fleximetal is a modern percussion instrument (an indirectly struck idiophone) consisting of a small flexible metal sheet suspended in a wire frame ending in a handle. Used in classic cartoons for its glissando effect, its sound is comparable to the musical saw. History, construction and technique An invention for a flexatone occurs in the British Patent Records of 1922 and 1923. In 1924 the 'Flex-a-tone' was patented in the USA by the Playatone Company of New York. "An instrument called the 'Flex-a-tone' was patented in the U.S.A. in 1924 by the Playertone Company of New York. It was introduced as a new instrument, making 'jazz jazzier' and announced as combining the tone effect of musical saw, orchestra bells, and song whistle." "Small sheet of spring steel in a frame with wooden strikers mounted on either side. The player shakes the beater while bending the steel in order to change the pitch." The instrument was first used in 1920s jazz bands as an ef ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maraca
A maraca ( , , ), sometimes called shaker or chac-chac, is a rattle which appears in many genres of Caribbean and Latin music. It is shaken by a handle and usually played as part of a pair. Maracas, also known as tamaracas, were rattles of divination, an oracle of the Brazilian Tupinamba people, found also with other Indigenous ethnic groups, such as the Guarani, Orinoco and in Florida. Rattles made from ''Lagenaria'' gourds are being shaken by the natural grip, while the round '' Crescentia'' calabash fruits are fitted to a handle. Human hair is sometimes fastened on the top, and a slit is cut in it to represent a mouth, through which their shamans (''payes'') made it utter its responses. A few pebbles are inserted to make it rattle and it is crowned with the red feathers of the ( scarlet ibis). It was used at their dances and to heal the sick. Andean curanderos (healers) use maracas in their healing rites. Modern maraca balls are also made of leather, wood or plastic. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
