A Popular Account of Ancient Musical Instruments and Their Development, as Illustrated by Typical Examples in the Galpin Collection at Hatfield, Broad Oak, Essex

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Clarke, 1897 - Musical instruments - 109 pages
 

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Page 34 - One kid of the goats for a. sin offering; beside the sin offering of atonement, and the continual burnt offering, and the meat offering of it, and their drink offerings. 12 And on the fifteenth day of the seventh month ye shall have an holy convocation; ye shall do no servile work...
Page 12 - To Drumbleby's, the pipe-maker, there to advise about the making of a flageolet to go low and soft; and he do show me a way which do do, and also a fashion of having two pipes of the same note fastened together, so as I can play on one, and then echo it upon the other, which is mighty pretty.
Page 82 - The square piano-forte, wo have said, was taken from the clavichord, but it retains only its shape, with the same disposition of the strings and keys ; their actions have no similarity. The action of the clavichord was simply a piece of brass pin wire, which was placed vertically at a point where it could be struck or pressed against its proper string, the right-hand division of which was free to vibrate, whilst the left-hand was muffled by a piece of cloth, the object of which was to damp or stop...
Page 99 - dicuntur omuia instruraenta musicorum,' &c. The descriptions left us by different authors of the musical instruments of the early part of the middle ages, and the representations of them on several monuments, prove that attempts were made at several periods to improve them. Much thought was expended in discovering the best method of introducing air into the pipes of their organ. For this purpose a fall of water was employed, and also what must be understood to have been steam. William of Malmsbury...
Page 86 - ... which has been made to the action of the square piano-forte, the check. This member was borrowed from the grand piano-forte, and is so acknowledged by the name given to those square pianofortes which have it ; for they are always called, par excellence, grand-square piano-fortes. The check certainly is a most important part of a piano-forte, and the best of actions is nothing without it. The check is placed behind the hammer, nearly at the end of the key; where, after the blow has been given,...
Page 98 - ... which we call the Organ. It can hardly be doubted that this instrument may be traced to Pan's-pipes, or the Syrinx. It must soon have been discovered that the air may be forced into a closed cavity, and then distributed at will to one or more tubes ; and pursuing the contrivance a little further, something like a modern organ was likely to be produced. Indeed...
Page 100 - Vitruvius is the first writer who gives any account of an organ of that kind. The period when the organ was introduced into the churches of Western Europe is very uncertain. Pope Vitalian is supposed to have been the first to admit the inP.
Page 50 - ... projets de la communauté pour la perfection des arts qui en « font l'objet , d'y comprendre un certain nombre de gens sans « capacité , dont les talents sont bornés à l'amusement du peuple « dans les rues et dans les guinguettes , il leur sera permis d'y
Page 100 - ORG strument, about the year 670; but the earliest account to be at all relied on, of the introduction of this instrument in the West, is, that about the year 755 the Greek emperor Copronymus sent one as a present to Pepin, king of France. In the time of Charlemagne however organs became common in Europe. That prince had one built at Aix-laChapelle, in 812, on a Gieek model, which the learned Benedictine, Bedos de Celles, in his vast but useful and excellent work, L'Art du Facteur des Orgues (1766),...
Page 48 - The facility with which the marine trumpet yields the natural harmonics is due to its single string and its lopsided bridge. Paganini's extraordinary effects in harmonics on a single string, were in fact produced by temporarily converting his violin into a small marine trumpet. As is well known, that clever player placed his single fourth string on the treble side of the bridge, screwing it up to a Very high pitch, and leaving the bass foot of the bridge comparatively loose. He thus produced a powerful...

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