Zithers
Zithers (; , from the Greek word ''cithara'') are a class of stringed instruments. Historically, the name has been applied to any instrument of the psaltery family, or to an instrument consisting of many strings stretched across a thin, flat body. This article describes the latter variety. Zithers are typically played by strumming or plucking the strings with the fingers or a plectrum. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, the term refers to a larger family of similarly shaped instruments that also includes the hammered dulcimer family and piano and a few rare bowed instruments like the bowed psaltery, bowed dulcimer, and streichmelodion. Like an acoustic guitar or lute, a zither's body serves as a resonating chamber (sound box), but, unlike guitars and lutes, a zither lacks a distinctly separate neck assembly. The number of strings varies, from one to more than fifty. In modern common usage the term "zither" refers to three specific instruments: the concert zithe ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Tube Zither
The tube zither is a stringed musical instrument in which a tube functions both as an instrument's neck and its soundbox. As the neck, it holds strings taut and allows them to vibrate. As a soundbox or it modifies the sound and transfers it to the open air. The instruments are among the oldest of chordophones, being "a very early stage" in the development of chordophones, and predate some of the oldest chordophones, such as the Chinese Se, zithers built on a tube split in half. Most tube zithers are made of bamboo, played today in Madagascar, India, Southeast Asia and Taiwan. Tube zithers made from other materials have been found in Europe and the United States, made from materials such as cornstalks and cactus. There are both round and half tube zithers, as well as tube zithers with the strings cut out of the bamboo body, ''idiochordic'', or, rarely, have separate strings, ''heterochordic''. Cultural connections The areas where the bamboo tube zither has been used was connec ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Board Zither
Zithers (; , from the Greek word ''cithara'') are a class of stringed instruments. Historically, the name has been applied to any instrument of the psaltery family, or to an instrument consisting of many strings stretched across a thin, flat body. This article describes the latter variety. Zithers are typically played by strumming or plucking the strings with the fingers or a plectrum. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, the term refers to a larger family of similarly shaped instruments that also includes the hammered dulcimer family and piano and a few rare bowed instruments like the bowed psaltery, bowed dulcimer, and streichmelodion. Like an acoustic guitar or lute, a zither's body serves as a resonating chamber (sound box), but, unlike guitars and lutes, a zither lacks a distinctly separate neck assembly. The number of strings varies, from one to more than fifty. In modern common usage the term "zither" refers to three specific instruments: the concert zithe ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Hornbostel–Sachs
Hornbostel–Sachs or Sachs–Hornbostel is a system of musical instrument classification devised by Erich Moritz von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs, and first published in the in 1914. An English translation was published in the '' Galpin Society Journal'' in 1961. It is the most widely used system for classifying musical instruments by ethnomusicologists and organologists (people who study musical instruments). The system was updated in 2011 as part of the work of the Musical Instrument Museums Online (MIMO) Project. Hornbostel and Sachs based their ideas on a system devised in the late 19th century by Victor-Charles Mahillon, the curator of musical instruments at Brussels Conservatory. Mahillon divided instruments into four broad categories according to the nature of the sound-producing material: an air column; string; membrane; and body of the instrument. From this basis, Hornbostel and Sachs expanded Mahillon's system to make it possible to classify any instrument from any cult ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Trough Zither
Trough zithers are a group of African stringed instruments or chordophones whose members resemble wooden bowls, pans, platters, or shallow gutters with strings stretched across the opening. A type of zither, the instruments may be quiet, depending upon the shape of the bowl or string-holder. Sound is often amplified with the addition of a gourd resonator. Instruments have been classed into five different types, based on shape. The resonator is most commonly a gourd, but tin cans have also been used. An instrument of East and Central Africa, mainly Rwanda and Burundi. Parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo and Tanzania as well, near the borders with Rwanda and Burundi. File:Trough Zither, Democratic Republic of Congo, late 19th century.jpg, Unidentified trough zither, Democratic Republic of Congo, late 19th century. 13 x 6 in. (33 x 15.2 cm). Type E. File:Afrikaabteilung in Ethnological Museum Berlin 56.JPG, Center: six-string bowl zither (ligombo) of type B from the Ny ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Chordophone
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner. Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum—and others by hitting the strings with a light wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow. In some keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord, the musician presses a key that plucks the string. Other musical instruments generate sound by striking the string. With bowed instruments, the player pulls a rosined horsehair bow across the strings, causing them to vibrate. With a hurdy-gurdy, the musician cranks a wheel whose rosined edge touches the strings. Bowed instruments include the string section instruments of the orchestra in Western classical music (violin, viola, cello and double bass) and a number of other instruments (e.g., viols and gambas used in early music from the Baroque ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Stringed Instruments
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner. Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum—and others by hitting the strings with a light wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow. In some keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord, the musician presses a key that plucks the string. Other musical instruments generate sound by striking the string. With bowed instruments, the player pulls a rosined horsehair bow across the strings, causing them to vibrate. With a hurdy-gurdy, the musician cranks a wheel whose rosined edge touches the strings. Bowed instruments include the string section instruments of the orchestra in Western classical music (violin, viola, cello and double bass) and a number of other instruments (e.g., viols and gambas used in early music from the Baroque m ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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String Instrument
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner. Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum—and others by hitting the strings with a light wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow. In some keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord, the musician presses a key that plucks the string. Other musical instruments generate sound by striking the string. With bowed instruments, the player pulls a rosined horsehair bow across the strings, causing them to vibrate. With a hurdy-gurdy, the musician cranks a wheel whose rosined edge touches the strings. Bowed instruments include the string section instruments of the orchestra in Western classical music (violin, viola, cello and double bass) and a number of other instruments (e.g., viols and gambas used in early music from the Baro ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Bar Zither
Bar zither is class of musical instruments (subset of zither) within the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system for a type of simple chordophone (stringed instrument), in which the body of the instrument is shaped like a bar. In the system, bar zithers are made up of musical bows and stick zithers. Musical bows have flexible ends, stick zithers are rigid or have only one flexed end. Bar zithers, whether musical bow or stick zithers, often have some form of resonator. Examples of resonators include the player's mouth, an attached gourd or an inflated balloon or bladder. According to Sachs,Sachs, Curt (1940). ''The History of Musical Instruments'', p.463. W. W. Nortan & Company, Inc. Instruments may be monochords (single stringed) or polychord (multiple stinged). They may also be idiochords (string made from the bar or stick) or heterchords (string made of separate substance from the bar or stick. File:Richard Nunns 22.jpg, Man playing a heterochord musical bow, using his mou ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Stick Zither
Bar zither is class of musical instruments (subset of zither) within the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system for a type of simple chordophone (stringed instrument), in which the body of the instrument is shaped like a bar. In the system, bar zithers are made up of musical bows and stick zithers. Musical bows have flexible ends, stick zithers are rigid or have only one flexed end. Bar zithers, whether musical bow or stick zithers, often have some form of resonator. Examples of resonators include the player's mouth, an attached gourd or an inflated balloon or bladder. According to Sachs,Sachs, Curt (1940). ''The History of Musical Instruments'', p.463. W. W. Nortan & Company, Inc. Instruments may be monochords (single stringed) or polychord (multiple stinged). They may also be idiochords (string made from the bar or stick) or heterchords (string made of separate substance from the bar or stick. File:Richard Nunns 22.jpg, Man playing a heterochord musical bow, using his m ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Raft Zither
A raft zither is a group of single-cord tube zithers, connected together to form a "raft". Tube zithers use a tube as a platform to hold a string (either tied onto the tube or cut out of the tube itself), raised with bridges. The flat surface of the raft is the base for the strings, and the multiple instruments form a single instrument with many notes. Each tube zither in the raft zither has a different note, and the idiochord An idiochord ( la, idio – "self", chord – "string", also known as a drum zither) is a musical instrument in which the "string" of the instrument is made from the same material as its resonating body. Such instruments may be found in the Indian O ... instruments become a single heterochord instrument. The raft zither is also related to the board zither, which uses a board as the base for its many strings. One example of a raft zither is the Totombito zither, from Congo. Other African examples may be found in Nigeria and East Africa. In Nepal, the Dh ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Harp Zither
The guitar zither (also chord zither, fretless zither, mandolin zither or harp zither) is a musical instrument consisting of a sound-box with two sets of unstopped strings. One set of strings is tuned to the diatonic, chromatic, or partially chromatic scale and the other set is tuned to make the various chords in the principal key of the melody strings. First patented May 29, 1894 by Friederich Menzenhauer Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 520,651, dated May 29, 1894. Application filed April 20, 1893, Serial No.471,147. (No model.), United States Patent Office (1858-1937), the guitar zither came into use in the late 19th century and was widely mass-produced in the United States and in Germany by Menzenhauer and later by [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Frame Zither
Frame zither is a class of musical instrument (subset of zither) within the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system for a type of simple chordophone (stringed instrument), in which the body of the instrument is made from a frame. Frame zithers are musical instruments in which strings are strung across an open frame. They could be similar to harps and psalteries which can also have strings stretched across frames. However, in harps the strings run from the frame to a resonating table embedded into the frame on the frame's other end. Psalteries may also have a frame, but behind the strings (parallel to them) is a board, the top of a box which acts as a resonator. Musicians may add a resonator as is done with a bow harp; they can attach or put the instrument into a calabash gourd or a ceramic pot. Under the Hornbostel-Sachs system of musical instrument classification, any frame with strings stretched across, and without a built in resonator, would count as a frame zither. In music ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |