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The most commonly used system in use in the west today divides instruments into String Instrument s, Wind Instrument s and Percussion Instrument s. However other ones have been devised, and some cultures also use different schemes. The oldest known scheme of classifying instruments is Chinese and dates from the 4th Century BC . It groups instruments according to what they are made out of. All instruments made out of Stone are in one group, all those made out of Wood in another, those made out of Silk are in a third, and so on. More usually, instruments are classified according to how the sound is initially produced (regardless of post-processing, i.e. an electric guitar is still a string-instrument regardless of what analog or digital/computational post-processing effects pedals may be used with it). STRINGS, PERCUSSION, AND WIND The system used in the west today, dividing instruments into wind, strings, and percussion, is of Greek origin. The scheme was later expanded by Martin Agricola , who distinguished plucked string instruments, such as Guitar s, from bowed string instruments, such as Violin s. Classical Musicians today do not always maintain this division (although plucked strings are grouped separately from bowed strings in Sheet Music ), but there is a distinction made between wind instruments with a reed ( Woodwind Instrument s) and wind instruments where the air is set in motion directly by the lips ( Brass Instrument s). There are, however, problems with this system. Some rarely seen and non-western instruments do not fit very neatly into it. The Serpent , for example, an old instrument rarely seen nowadays, ought to be classified as a brass instrument, as a column of air is set in motion by the lips. However, it looks more like a woodwind instrument, and is closer to one in many ways, having finger-holes to control pitch, rather than valves. There are also problems with classifying certain Keyboard Instrument s. For example, the Piano has strings, but they are struck by hammers, so it is not clear whether it should be classified as a string instrument, or a percussion instrument. For this reason, keyboard instruments are often regarded as inhabiting a category of their own, including all instruments played by a keyboard, whether they have struck strings (like the piano), plucked strings (like the Harpsichord ) or no strings at all (like the Celesta ). It might be said that with these extra categories, the classical system of instrument classification focuses less on the fundamental way in which instruments produce sound, and more on the technique required to play them. MAHILLON AND HORNBOSTEL SACHS SYSTEMS An ancient system of and Curt Sachs who published an extensive new scheme for classication in ''Zeitschrift für Ethnologie'' in 1914 . Their scheme is widely used today, and is most often known as the Sachs-Hornbostel system (or the Hornbostel-Sachs system). The original Sachs-Hornbostel system classified instruments into four main groups: # Idiophone s, such as the Xylophone , which produce sound by vibrating themselves; # Membranophone s, such as Drum s or Kazoo s, which produce sound by a vibrating membrane; # Chordophone s, such as the piano or Cello , which produce sound by vibrating strings; # Aerophone s, such as the Pipe Organ or Oboe , which produce sound by vibrating columns of air. Later Sachs added a fifth category, and Organologists . Metal idiophones are frequently called Metallophone s. See also Lamellophone . ANDRE SCHAEFFNER'S 2-CLASS SOLID VERSUS GAS SYSTEM Strings and percussion are more similar to one-another than either is to wind instruments. Indeed, the existence and ubiquity of the Piano call into question the boundary between strings and percussion: both produce sound by matter in its solid state, whereas wind instruments produce sound by matter in its gaseous state. Similarly, idiophones, membranophones, and chordophones also produce sound by matter in its solid state, whereas wind instruments produce sound by matter in its gaseous state. In 1932, Andre Schaeffner developed a new classification scheme that was "exhaustive, potentially covering all real and conceivable instruments" (cite Kartomi, page 176, "On Concepts and Classifications of Musical Instruments", by Margaret J. Kartomi, University of Chicago Press, Chicago Studies in Ethnomusicology (CSE), 1990). Schaeffner's system has only two top-level categories which he denoted by Roman numerals:
PHYSICS-BASED CLASSIFICATION SCHEME The recent invention of a number of instruments that make sound from vibrating water has prompted the recent introduction of a physics-based organology in which the top-level category is the state-of-matter of that which initially produces the sound in the instrument. This system includes the possibility of instruments that make sound in all three states-of-matter (solid, liquid, and gas), with a fourth category for instruments that make sound from high-energy states such as plasma. As with Schaeffner's system, the first three-categories of the Hornbostel Sachs system thus fall under the first category of the physical organology system, but it has been proposed that chordophones should come first, since they are 1-dimensional solids, then membranophones second, since they are two-dimensional solids, which is a reversal of the order in the Hornbostel Sachs system (reference: "Natural Interfaces for Musical Expression and a physics-based organology", by S. Mann, in Proceedings of the New Interfaces for Musical Expression, June 6, 2007, New York, New York). This physical organology is as follows:
Note that instruments in the fourth category, while often using electricity, are not electrophones, because they generate sound acoustically, not electronically. The initial sound-production means of an ionophone is typically an electric spark or other discharge phenomena that generates plasma. Some such instruments, like the plasmaphone, use one or more plasma balls as the user-interface, but the sound originally comes from matter in its plasma state, not electronically, regardless of whether the matter producing the sound may have been excited into the plasma state electronically. In physical organology the fifth category is broadened to include other forms of algorithmic/computation, such as mechanical or optical computing, so that it is not limited to electrical computation or electric circuits that generate the initial sound. Quintessence is the fifth Classical Greek Element after Earth, Water, Air, and Fire. Plato and Aristotle both referred to Quintessence/Idea as the fifth element ("Quint" meaning "Fifth"). Classifications based on surrounding media At the International Computer Music Conference in 2007, the conference theme was Immersed Music and featured a some immersed performances and concerts. This raised some important questions regarding the role of the surrounding medium (air or water) in which a musical instrument is played, as well as the role of water in other non-hydraulophonic instruments. For example, Benjamin Franklin's glass (h)armonica remains a friction idiophone regardless of the fact that it is played by wet fingers. A version of the armonica designed to be played underwater was recently created. This version is still a friction idiophone, not a hydraulophone. Likewise, arrays of drinking glasses tuned with water are still idiophones, as the water is not what produces the initial sound, but is merely a tuning element. The matter of the surrounding medium in which the instrument and/or listener is/are immersed, does not, therefore, alter the principal classification of the instrument, but, rather, may be thought of as a form of post-processing of the sound. For example, a guitar, immersed in water, sounds quite different than it does in air, and additionally there are differences between whether or not the listener is also immersed in the same water. However, regardless of these immersions, the guitar, wet or dry, is still a chordophone. INSTRUMENTS BY RANGE Western instruments are also often classified by their musical range in comparison with other instruments in the same family. These terms are named after singing voice classifications:
Some instruments fall into more than one category: for example, the cello may be considered either tenor or bass, depending on how its music fits into the ensemble, and the trombone may be alto, tenor, or bass and the French horn, bass, baritone, tenor, or alto, depending on which range it is played. Many instruments have their range as part of their name: , Contrabass Clarinet . When used in the name of an instrument, these terms are relative, describing the instrument's range in comparison to other instruments of its family and not in comparison to the human voice range or instruments of other families. For example, a bass flute's range is from C3 to F♯6, while a bass clarinet plays about one octave lower. OTHER CLASSIFICATIONS Various groups of instruments are known after a common, though often not exclusive, type or sphere of use, such as a trumpet, signifying its octave. SEE ALSO |
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