Guitar

The guitar is a musical instrument of the lute family. It has a flat, waisted body with a round sound hole, a fretted neck, and six strings. The strings are made of nylon now, rather than gut, and the new strings are stronger, require less frequent tuning, and produce better sound.

Guitar-like instruments have existed since ancient times (in Babylonia, Egypt, and Rome), but the first written mention of an actual guitar is from the 14th century. It is believed to have originated in Spain. The gittern, a small lute-like instrument, came to Europe via Moorish Spain in the second half of the 13th century.

The guitar attained its modern form in the mid-18th century. The sixth string was added at that time, the most important factor in the development of the guitar.

The guitar became popular in European countries in the 16th and 17th centuries and flourished in Spain in the 19th century. Its popularity can be attributed to the nomadic nature of the troubadours, who traveled the continent and gave performances.

The guitar was known in the New World as early as the 16th century when the Spanish colonizers sold “vihuelas” to the Aztec Indians. Its wide appeal as a folk instrument led to its important role today in rock and pop music.

In the 20th century, there has been an unprecedented rise in the acceptance of the guitar as an instrument for serious artistic expression.

•Back to Instruments•

Violin

The violin began taking its present-day shape during the 16th century. It is the only instrument which has remained unchanged over 300 years—since being brought to perfection by the old violin makers of Cremona and Brescia of Italy.

More music has been written for the violin than any other orchestral instrument. Known as the king of instruments, it is the lead voice and most numerous instrument of the modern orchestra. It is the most versatile and expressive stringed instrument because of its wide range of tones. Sound is produced when the strings are rubbed with a bow, plucked, or struck.

The violin is one of the smallest members of the string family; its name, in Italian, means “little viola.” Whereas modern violins have four strings, we know from works of art dating back to the 1500s that the old violins had three strings. Today’s instrument also has a longer neck. The creation of the chin rest by virtuoso Louis Spohr in about 1820 was one of the important developments regarding the violin. It freed up the left hand from supporting the instrument and therefore made possible a greater use of vibrato, which adds intensity to the tone and is one of the main characteristics of modern violin-playing.

•Back to Instruments•

Double Bass

The modern double bass is not a true member of either the violin or viol families. Its first general shape was probably that of a violone, the largest member of the viol family.

The Germans developed the double bass along the shape of the viol—with sloping shoulders and a flat back. The Italians, on the other hand, built many early basses more like the violin, with violin corners and curved backs.

The double bass appeared sporadically throughout the early Baroque period. Its heavy, thick gut strings and great size inhibited its use in anything smaller than a church, and it probably would have become extinct if not for the appearance of the overwound gut string in the 1650s. It was easier to finger and bow the new strings. The thinner strings also made it possible to reduce the size of the double bass without compromising the sound.

Domenico Dragonetti (1763-1846) was the first great virtuoso of the instrument and was largely responsible for its permanent place in the orchestra

•Back to Instruments•

.

Electric Guitar

The development of the electric solid body guitar has a great deal to do with the popularity of Hawaiian music in the 1920s and 1930s. Hawaiian guitars were played with a metal slide and were the first instruments that depended entirely on their sound being amplified electrically, not just acoustically.

The electric guitar was a completely American creation and was made possible by earlier developments in acoustic guitar design, especially the introduction of steel strings in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. American designers were starting to exploit the metal strings’ magnetic characteristics as well as their acoustic properties. However, the principles underlying the operation of the electric guitar had been familiar to scientists since the 19th century when discoveries were made about the nature of electricity and magnetism by Danish physicist Hans Oersted and English scientist Michael Faraday. George Breed, a U.S. naval officer, also played an important part in the development of the electric guitar. His instrument—though cumbersome and impractical—appears to be the first documented example of a guitar using electromagnetism (in 1890).

Another key figure in the development of the electric guitar was Alolph Rickenbacker. While making metal components for Dopera Brothers’ National Resonator Guitars, he met George Beauchamp and Paul Barth, who had been working on the principle of magnetic pick-up. Pick-ups were used to amplify the sounds of the strings. The three of them formed the Electro String Company and produced their first Hawaiian guitars in 1931. Their success prompted Gibson and others to start producing electric guitars.

The new Gibson electric models became firmly established in the 1940s. Leo Fender developed a new, smaller pick-up around that time and formed the Fender Electric Instrument Company in 1946, which produced the Broadcaster guitar.

Les Paul was also experimenting with pick-ups during the 1930s. He had experienced feedback and resonance problems and began to think about a solid body guitar to resolve those problems. He is credited with inventing the solid body guitar in the 1940s.

The electric guitar generated a certain amount of resistance in the beginning, but in the 1930s, more and more American players took up the amplified instrument.

•Back to Instruments•

Electric Bass

The electric bass guitar is descended from the early double bass and other bass instruments. One of the first known bass instruments was the “viola da Gamba” from the late 15th century. For about 300 years, the bass went back and forth between three and four strings throughout Europe.

Electric basses were being built as early as the 1930s, but Leo Fender took the instrument into mainstream production with the invention of the Fender Precision bass in 1951. Since it was shaped like a solid body guitar, it could be played more easily than the large double bass.

The electric bass remains very much the same as Fenders’ original design, although five and six string basses are also available now.

•Back to Instruments•

Flute

The flute is the most ancient of wind instruments. Early flutes were vertical and were made of animal bones, such as a reindeer horn. Sound was produced by blowing across the open top. Egyptian flutes date back to at least 2000 B.C. A descendant of the early vertical flutes—the n’ay—is still played in some Islamic countries today.

The modern version of the flute—which first came to Europe in the 12th century from the East—is called a transverse flute. It is held horizontally and blown into from the side.

The early flutes had no keys, just holes, and were made of one piece. They were poor in quality and pitch. Theobald Boehm of Munich revolutionized the flute in the 1830s. He developed a cylindrical flute with 15 tone holes and 23 keys and levers. The tone holes were placed in acoustically correct positions for the first time in history. This instrument, known as the Boehm flute, is the type of flute that is played today.

•Back to Instruments•

Cajon

The cajon is a percussion instrument believed to have originated in Peru. It is a wooden box which the player sits on and plays between his legs. Five sides of the box are made out of hardwood, and the sixth side—the head or striking surface—is made out of a thin sheet of plywood. A sound hole is cut at the back of the instrument.

The cajon can be traced back to the African slaves who were brought to Peru in the 16th century. Since they were forbidden to play their own instruments, they used household appliances (such as kitchen chairs, table tops, and boxes) as percussion instruments until the cajon was created in this century. Afro-Peruvian music blends Spanish, Andean, and African traditions.

Although the cajon originated in Peru, it also took hold in Cuba, where workers used to sit on the docks drumming on packing crates. Today the Peruvian cajon is heard extensively in Andean, Cuban, and Flamenco music and—with its wide and useful variety of tones—has been gaining popularity in all types of music.

•Back to Instruments•

Udu

The udu is a Nigerian clay drum that evolved from a water jug with another hole in the side. It was created many years ago by Igbo women who used it as a musical instrument for ceremonial occasions. It is considered a healing instrument. Udu means both pot and peace in the Ibo language of Nigeria.

The udu has become a popular instrument in the West and is often used on movie soundtracks. Many modern versions of the udu are being produced today. They have a wider range of tones than the traditional instrument.

•Back to Instruments•

Tabla

Tabla is a pair of drums, consisting of a small, high-pitched, right-hand drum called “dayan” and a larger, metal, low-pitched one called “bayan.” There is a large black spot on the surface of each drum, made of a mixture of gum, soot, and iron fillings. This is what creates the bell-like tone of the tabla.

The tabla is the main percussion instrument used in North Indian classical music. It is believed that the present form dates back to about 300 years ago when it first became popular in the royal courts of Delhi. However, instruments similar to the tabla can be seen in Indian temple sculptures dating back thousands of years.

There are six schools of tabla playing, each representing distinct regional performance styles. Students learn how to play the instrument from a guru (teacher), not from books, because the strong bond between teacher and student is considered essential for passing on the musical tradition from generation to generation.

•Back to Instruments•

Doumbek (or Darbukka)

The doumbek (also called darabukka, derbocka, or dumbelek) is known as a goblet drum and is an important instrument in the Middle East and North Africa. It can be made from clay, wood, or metal, but all have a single head, usually of goat skin, and are played under the arm. It is said that the instrument gets its name from its two main sounds: the dum, which is the deep tone from the center of the drum, and the bek, the higher, sharper tone produced from striking the rim.

The first doumbek artifacts date back to 4,000 B.C. and were found in Bohemia—not in the Middle East, as is generally believed. A Celtic tribe called the Boiis developed the doumbek.

•Back to Instruments•

Congas

What we call conga drums or congas in the United States are more accurately called tumbadoras in Cuba where these drums were developed. The word “conga” is usually applied to a drum and rhythm played during Carnaval, whereas “tumbadora” refers to the drum played in most traditional and commercial Cuban music. However, the names became confused and are now basically interchangeable.

The tumbadora is essential to all Latin rhythms, especially Afro-Cuban rhythms. It is also an indispensable part of Conga rhythms. It is a hybrid instrument, the result of many African and Cuban influences. After slavery was abolished in Cuba in 1886, many Africans moved to urban areas and lived in “solares” (slums). This is where tumbadoras developed, as well as the percussive music known as rumba. Most of the Cuban slaves were from the Bantu-speaking nations of the Congo.

Though the drums of the Bantu people probably had the strongest influence on the tumbadoras, those of the Lucumi (descendants of the Yoruba people of Nigeria) also had an impact on the tumbadoras. The Lucumi drum called bembe was almost identical to the tumbadora, though slightly smaller.

The development of rumba is inseparable from that of the tumbadoras. It was the first music to make use of drums specifically called tumbadoras and led to their use as a popular and serious instrument.

The first and most important change in Afro-Cuban drum construction that led to the development of the tumbadora was the use of stave construction, similar to the way barrels were made. This change made the drums different from the original African ones, which were often banned during the Spanish colonial rule in Cuba. The change in construction allowed the blacks to continue playing their drums, which still had their African shape, sound, and tuning method. The early drums were tuned by holding a flame near the drumhead to evaporate the retained moisture. Later, lug-tuned drums were developed, and they became widespread in the mid-1950s.

In the late 1930s and early 1940s, the tumbadoras began to find their place in popular Cuban music, as well as in the U.S.

•Back to Instruments•