The bayan ( rus, бая́н, p=bɐˈjan) is a type of

chromatic button accordion A chromatic button accordion is a type of button accordion where the melody-side keyboard consists of rows of buttons arranged chromatically. The bass-side keyboard is usually the Stradella system or one of the various free-bass systems. Incl ...

developed in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

in the early 20th century and named after the 11th-century

bard In Celtic cultures, a bard is a professional story teller, verse-maker, music composer, oral historian and genealogist, employed by a patron (such as a monarch or chieftain) to commemorate one or more of the patron's ancestors and to praise t ...

Boyan Boyan may refer to: People * Bojan, a common Slavic given name spelled as Boyan in Bulgarian * Boyan (bard) (10th–11th century), a bard active at the court of Yaroslav the Wise * Boyan (given name), a common Bulgarian given name * Boyan (Hasid ...

Characteristics

The bayan differs from western chromatic button accordions in some details of construction: *

Reed Reed or Reeds may refer to: Science, technology, biology, and medicine * Reed bird (disambiguation) * Reed pen, writing implement in use since ancient times * Reed (plant), one of several tall, grass-like wetland plants of the order Poales * ...

s are broader and

rectangular In Euclidean plane geometry, a rectangle is a quadrilateral with four right angles. It can also be defined as: an equiangular quadrilateral, since equiangular means that all of its angles are equal (360°/4 = 90°); or a parallelogram containin ...

(rather than

trapezoid A quadrilateral with at least one pair of parallel sides is called a trapezoid () in American and Canadian English. In British and other forms of English, it is called a trapezium (). A trapezoid is necessarily a Convex polygon, convex quadri ...

al). * Reeds are often attached in large groups to a common plate (rather than in pairs); the plates are

screw A screw and a bolt (see '' Differentiation between bolt and screw'' below) are similar types of fastener typically made of metal and characterized by a helical ridge, called a ''male thread'' (external thread). Screws and bolts are used to fa ...

ed to the reed block (rather than attached with

wax Waxes are a diverse class of organic compounds that are lipophilic, malleable solids near ambient temperatures. They include higher alkanes and lipids, typically with melting points above about 40 °C (104 °F), melting to giv ...

). * The

melody A melody (from Greek language, Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a Linearity#Music, linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most liter ...

-side

keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...

is attached near the middle of the body (rather than at the rear). * Reeds are generally not tuned with

tremolo In music, ''tremolo'' (), or ''tremolando'' (), is a trembling effect. There are two types of tremolo. The first is a rapid reiteration: * Of a single Musical note, note, particularly used on String instrument#Bowing, bowed string instrument ...

. *

Register Register or registration may refer to: Arts entertainment, and media Music * Register (music), the relative "height" or range of a note, melody, part, instrument, etc. * ''Register'', a 2017 album by Travis Miller * Registration (organ), th ...

switches may be operated with the chin on some larger models (also possible with some larger European button accordions). * The diminished chord row is shifted, so that the diminished G chord is where one would expect the diminished C chord in the

Stradella bass system The Stradella Bass System (sometimes called ''standard bass'') is a buttonboard layout equipped on the bass side of many accordions, which uses columns of buttons arranged in a circle of fifths; this places the principal major chords of a key (I, ...

. * Converter switches that go from standard preset chords to free bass (individual bass notes) are common on the larger instruments. As opposed to Western conventions, in free bass mode the low notes usually are at the bottom of the instrument and the high notes at the top. * Newer instruments may feature a register where every tone played actually produces a

perfect fifth In music theory, a perfect fifth is the Interval (music), musical interval corresponding to a pair of pitch (music), pitches with a frequency ratio of 3:2, or very nearly so. In classical music from Western culture, a fifth is the interval fro ...

. The differences in internal construction give the bayan a different tone color from Western instruments, and the bass has a much fuller sound. Because of their range and purity of tone, bayans are often the instrument of choice for accordion virtuosi who perform classical and

contemporary classical music Contemporary classical music is classical music composed close to the present day. At the beginning of the 21st century, it commonly referred to the post-1945 modern forms of post-tonal music after the death of Anton Webern, and included seria ...

. Two Soviet composers of note who wrote compositions for bayan are

Vladislav Zolotaryov Vladislav Andreyevich Zolotaryov (russian: Владислав Андреевич Золотарёв, De-Kastri, September 13, 1942 – Moscow, May 13, 1975) was a Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republ ...

and Sofia Gubaidulina. Slovak composer Peter Machajdík composed ''Concerto for two Bayans and Orchestra'', which was premiered by Acco Duo (Miran Vaupotić & Ivana Levak-Vaupotić), with the Symphony Orchestra of the Pomorian Philharmonic under Alexander Gref, at the Paderewski Philharmonic in Bydgoszcz, Poland on 4 June 2009. Russian Bayan virtuoso Stas Venglevski has premiered contemporary works by

Yehuda Yannay Yehuda Yannay (born May 26, 1937) is a composer. He was born in Timișoara, Romania, and emigrated to Israel in 1951. In Israel, he studied at the Rubin Academy, Tel Aviv. He subsequently studied at Brandeis University, the Tanglewood Music Ce ...

, Anthony Galla-Rini and

William Susman William Joseph Susman (born August 29, 1960) is an American composer of concert and film music and a pianist. He has written orchestral and chamber music as well as documentary film scores. Music Susman's music is inspired by Afro-Cuban montuñ ...

References

Sources

* Cherkaskyi, L. ''Ukrainski narodni muzychni instrumenty''. Tekhnika, Kyiv, Ukraine, 2003. 262 pages. .

External links

The Classical bayan
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bayan (Accordion) Accordion Ukrainian musical instruments Russian musical instruments Russian inventions

Characteristics

See also

References

Sources

External links