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Per Un Amico
''Per un amico'' ("''For a Friend''") is the second album from the Italian progressive rock band Premiata Forneria Marconi. Released in 1972 by all the initial members of the group, it is considered their breakthrough album that put them on the map. The album remains popular among progressive rock fans throughout Italy and the group will usually still perform all tracks on the album today. The album, still progressive at heart, additionally borrows influences from a variety of rock genres and subgenres. In an Allmusic review, ''Per un amico'' was lauded as a classic within the genre and deemed par to the work of the biggest progressive rock acts of the 1970s. Many of the songs from this album would appear either in their original form or re-recorded with vocals in English on PFM's English-language album ''Photos of Ghosts''. Composition and critical reception ''Per un amico'' is rooted within the progressive rock genre, yet includes elements of music ranging from avant-garde to ...
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Premiata Forneria Marconi
Premiata Forneria Marconi (PFM) (translation: ''Award-winning Marconi Bakery'') is an Italian progressive rock band founded in 1970 which continues to the present day. They were the first Italian group to have success internationally. The group recorded five albums with English lyrics between 1973 and 1977. During this period they entered both the British and American charts. They also had several successful European and American tours, playing at the popular Reading Festival in England and on a very popular national television program in the United States. PFM introduced new sounds, such as the synthesizer, to the Italian musical world. They were also among the first to combine symphonic classical and traditional Italian musical influences in a rock music context. Such innovations and their longevity have earned PFM a place among the most important bands in the Progressive rock genre. History 1966–1970 The original core members of PFM were Franco Mussida (guitars, v ...
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Mauro Pagani
Mauro Pagani (born 5 February 1946) is an Italian musician and singer. Pagani was born in Chiari, Lombardy. A multi-instrumentalist, he made his debut in the music world in 1970 as violinist and founding member of the progressive rock band Premiata Forneria Marconi. In 1977 he left the band to follow a solo career, but in 2003 rejoined for a celebrative concert. His first solo album, titled "Mauro Pagani" (released in Tokyo in 1979 on Seven Seas and distributed by King Record Co.) included contributions by fellow PFM members Franz Di Cioccio, Patrick Djivas, and Walter Calloni; also showcasing an impressive line-up of guest musicians, including Area's Demetrio Stratos, Peter Gabriel, Giulio Capiozzo, Patrizio Fariselli, Ellade Bandini and Ares Tavolazzi ("L'Albero Di Canto" and "L'Albero Di Canto II" with Area backing Mauro exclusively). Roberto Colombo also played polimoog on "La Città Aromatica". Pagani has been an experimenter of sound related to blues and Mediterranean music ...
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Mellotron
The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which pushes a length of magnetic tape against a capstan, which pulls it across a playback head. As the key is released, the tape is retracted by a spring to its initial position. Different portions of the tape can be played to access different sounds. The Mellotron evolved from the similar Chamberlin, but could be mass-produced more efficiently. The first models were designed for the home and contained a variety of sounds, including automatic accompaniments. Bandleader Eric Robinson and television personality David Nixon helped promote the first instruments, and celebrities such as Princess Margaret were early adopters. It was adopted by rock and pop groups in the mid to late 1960s. One of the first pop songs featuring the Mellotron was Manfred Mann's " Semi-Detached, Suburban Mr. James" (1966). The Beatles used it on tracks includ ...
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Minimoog
The Minimoog is an analog synthesizer first manufactured by Moog Music between 1970 and 1981. Designed as a more affordable, portable version of the modular Moog synthesizer, it was the first synthesizer sold in retail stores. It was first popular with progressive rock and jazz musicians and found wide use in disco, pop, rock and electronic music. Production of the Minimoog stopped in the early 1980s after the sale of Moog Music. In 2002, founder Robert Moog regained the rights to the Moog brand, bought the company, and released an updated version of the Minimoog, the Minimoog Voyager. In 2016 and in 2022, Moog Music released another new version of the original Minimoog. Development In the 1960s, RA Moog Co manufactured Moog synthesizers, which helped bring electronic sounds to music but remained inaccessible to ordinary people. These modular synthesizers were difficult to use and required users to connect components manually with patch cables to create sounds. They were a ...
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Hammond Organ
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated sound by creating an electric current from rotating a metal tonewheel near an electromagnetic pickup, and then strengthening the signal with an amplifier to drive a speaker cabinet. The organ is commonly used with the Leslie speaker. Around two million Hammond organs have been manufactured. The organ was originally marketed by the Hammond Organ Company to churches as a lower-cost alternative to the wind-driven pipe organ, or instead of a piano. It quickly became popular with professional jazz musicians in organ trios—small groups centered on the Hammond organ. Jazz club owners found that organ trios were cheaper than hiring a big band. Jimmy Smith's use of the Hammond B-3, with its additional harmonic percussion feature, inspired a g ...
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Keyboard Instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument played using a keyboard, a row of levers which are pressed by the fingers. The most common of these are the piano, organ, and various electronic keyboards, including synthesizers and digital pianos. Other keyboard instruments include celestas, which are struck idiophones operated by a keyboard, and carillons, which are usually housed in bell towers or belfries of churches or municipal buildings. Today, the term ''keyboard'' often refers to keyboard-style synthesizers. Under the fingers of a sensitive performer, the keyboard may also be used to control dynamics, phrasing, shading, articulation, and other elements of expression—depending on the design and inherent capabilities of the instrument. Another important use of the word ''keyboard'' is in historical musicology, where it means an instrument whose identity cannot be firmly established. Particularly in the 18th century, the harpsichord, the clavichord, and the early ...
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Spinet
A spinet is a smaller type of harpsichord or other keyboard instrument, such as a piano or organ. Harpsichords When the term ''spinet'' is used to designate a harpsichord, typically what is meant is the ''bentside spinet'', described in this section. For other uses, see below. The bentside spinet shares most of its characteristics with the full-size instrument, including action, soundboard, and case construction. What primarily distinguishes the spinet is the angle of its strings: whereas in a full-size harpsichord, the strings are at a 90-degree angle to the keyboard (that is, they are parallel to the player's gaze); and in virginals they are parallel to the keyboard, in a spinet the strings are at an angle of about 30 degrees to the keyboard, going toward the right. The case of a bentside spinet is approximately triangular. The side on the right is usually bent concavely (hence the name of the instrument), curving away from the player toward the right rear corner. The long ...
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Mandocello
The mandocello ( it, mandoloncello, Liuto cantabile, liuto moderno) is a plucked string instrument of the mandolin family. It is larger than the mandolin, and is the baritone instrument of the mandolin family. Its eight strings are in four paired courses, with the strings in each course tuned in unison. Overall tuning of the courses is in fifths like a mandolin, but beginning on bass C (C2). It can be described as being to the mandolin what the cello is to the violin.''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, Second Edition'', edited by Stanley Sadie and others (2001) Construction Mandocello construction is similar to the mandolin: the mandocello body may be constructed with a bowl-shaped back according to designs of the 18th-century Vinaccia school, or with a flat (arched) back according to the designs of Gibson Guitar Corporation popularized in the United States in the early 20th century. The scale of the mandocello is longer than that of the mandolin. Gibson exampl ...
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Theorbo
The theorbo is a plucked string instrument of the lute family, with an extended neck and a second pegbox. Like a lute, a theorbo has a curved-back sound box (a hollow box) with a wooden top, typically with a sound hole, and a neck extending out from the soundbox. As with the lute, the player plucks or strums the strings with one hand while "fretting" (pressing down) the strings with the other hand; pressing the strings in different places on the neck produces different pitches (notes), thus enabling the performer to play chords, basslines and melodies. It is related to the ''liuto attiorbato'', the French ', the archlute, the German baroque lute, and the '' angélique'' or ''angelica''. A theorbo differs from a regular lute in that the theorbo has a much longer neck which extends beyond the regular fingerboard/neck and a second pegbox at the end of the extended neck. (The pegboxes enable the lute to be tuned by turning the pegs to make the strings sound at higher or lower pitch ...
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Twelve-string Guitar
A twelve-string guitar (or 12-string guitar) is a steel-string guitar with 12 strings in six courses, which produces a thicker, more ringing tone than a standard six-string guitar. Typically, the strings of the lower four courses are tuned in octaves, with those of the upper two courses tuned in unison. The gap between the strings within each dual-string course is narrow, and the strings of each course are fretted and plucked as a single unit. The neck is wider, to accommodate the extra strings, and is similar to the width of a classical guitar neck. The sound, particularly on acoustic instruments, is fuller and more harmonically resonant than six-string instruments. The 12-string guitar can be played like a 6-string guitar as players still use the same notes, chords and guitar techniques like a standard 6-string guitar, but advanced techniques might be tough as players need to play or pluck two strings simultaneously. Structurally, 12-string guitars, especially those built befo ...
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Acoustic Guitar
An acoustic guitar is a musical instrument in the string family. When a string is plucked its vibration is transmitted from the bridge, resonating throughout the top of the guitar. It is also transmitted to the side and back of the instrument, resonating through the air in the body, and producing sound from the sound hole. The original, general term for this stringed instrument is ''guitar'', and the retronym 'acoustic guitar' distinguishes it from an electric guitar, which relies on electronic amplification. Typically, a guitar's body is a sound box, of which the top side serves as a sound board that enhances the vibration sounds of the strings. In standard tuning the guitar's six strings are tuned (low to high) E2 A2 D3 G3 B3 E4. Guitar strings may be plucked individually with a pick (plectrum) or fingertip, or strummed to play chords. Plucking a string causes it to vibrate at a fundamental pitch determined by the string's length, mass, and tension. (Overtones are also pres ...
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Electric Guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic guitar exist). It uses one or more pickups to convert the vibration of its strings into electrical signals, which ultimately are reproduced as sound by loudspeakers. The sound is sometimes shaped or electronically altered to achieve different timbres or tonal qualities on the amplifier settings or the knobs on the guitar from that of an acoustic guitar. Often, this is done through the use of effects such as reverb, distortion and "overdrive"; the latter is considered to be a key element of electric blues guitar music and jazz and rock guitar playing. Invented in 1932, the electric guitar was adopted by jazz guitar players, who wanted to play single-note guitar solos in large big band ensembles. Early proponents of the electric guitar on ...
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