Speaker 1: Welcome to the I Can't Sleep Podcast, where I help
Speaker 1: you drift off one fact at a time. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Benjamin Boster, and today's episode is about string instruments. Today
Speaker 1: we have a sponsored episode from Karina. She says Happy
Speaker 1: Birthday to Jordan from Karina. In musical instrument classification, string
Speaker 1: instruments or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from
Speaker 1: vibrating strings when a performer strums, plucks, or sounds as
Speaker 1: strings in varying manners. Musicians play some string instruments, like guitars,
Speaker 1: by plucking the strings with their fingers or a plectrum
Speaker 1: a pick, and others by hitting the strings with a
Speaker 1: light wooden hammer or by rubbing the strings with a bow,
Speaker 1: like violins. In some keyboard instruments, such as the harpsichord,
Speaker 1: the musician presses a key that plucks the string. Other
Speaker 1: musical instruments generate sound by striking the string. With bowed instruments,
Speaker 1: the player pulls a rosin horse hair bow across the strings,
Speaker 1: causing them to vibrate. With a hurdy gurdy, the musician
Speaker 1: cranks a wheel whose ros and edge touches the strings.
Speaker 1: Bowed instruments include the string section instruments of the orchestra
Speaker 1: and western and classical music, violin, viola, cello, and double bass,
Speaker 1: and a number of other instruments vials and gambas used
Speaker 1: in early music from the Baroque music era, and fiddles
Speaker 1: used in many types of folk music. All of the
Speaker 1: bowed string instruments can also be plucked with the fingers,
Speaker 1: a technique called pizzicato. A wide variety of techniques are
Speaker 1: used to sound notes on the electric guitar, including plucking
Speaker 1: with the finger, nails or plectrum, strumming and even tapping
Speaker 1: on the finger board, and using feedback from a loud
Speaker 1: distorted guitar amplifier to produce a sustained sound. Some string
Speaker 1: instruments are mainly plucked, such as the harp and the
Speaker 1: electric bass. Other examples include the citar, riebab banjo, mandolin, ukulele,
Speaker 1: and buzuki. In the hornbistil Sock's scheme of music instrument
Speaker 1: classification used in organology, string instruments are called cordophones. In
Speaker 1: most string instruments, the vibrations are transmitted to the body
Speaker 1: of the instrument, which often incorporates some sort of hollow
Speaker 1: or enclosed area. The body of the instrument also vibrates
Speaker 1: along with the air inside it. The vibration of the
Speaker 1: body of the instrument and the enclosed hollow or chamber
Speaker 1: make the vibration of the string more audible to the
Speaker 1: performer and audience. The body of most string instruments is
Speaker 1: hollow in order to have better sound projection. Some, however,
Speaker 1: such as electric guitar and other instruments that rely on
Speaker 1: electric amplification, may have a solid wood body dating to
Speaker 1: a round circa thirteen thousand b c. A cave painting
Speaker 1: in a Tooiefaser Cave in France depicts what some believe
Speaker 1: is a musical beau, a hunting beau used as a
Speaker 1: single stringed musical instrument. From the musical beau, families of
Speaker 1: stringed instruments developed. Since each string played a single note,
Speaker 1: adding strings added new notes, creating beaux harps, harps, and lyres.
Speaker 1: In turn, this led to being able to play diads
Speaker 1: and chords. Another innovation occurred when the beau harp was
Speaker 1: straightened out and a bridge used to lift the strings
Speaker 1: off the stick neck, creating the lute. This picture of
Speaker 1: musical beau to harp Beau his theory and has been contested.
Speaker 1: In nineteen sixty five, Franz Jannal wrote his criticism, stating
Speaker 1: that the early ancestors of plucked instruments are not currently known.
Speaker 1: He felt that the harp beau was a long cry
Speaker 1: from the sophistication of the civilization of Western Asia in
Speaker 1: four thousand b C. That took the primitive technology and
Speaker 1: created technically and artistically well made harps, liars, ciseras, and lutes.
Speaker 1: Archaeological digs have identified some of the earliest stringed instruments
Speaker 1: and ancient Mesopotamian sides, like the lyres of Or, which
Speaker 1: include artifacts over three thousand years old. The development of
Speaker 1: lyre instruments required the technology to create a tuning mechanism
Speaker 1: to tighten and loosen the string tension. Lyres with wooden
Speaker 1: bodies and strings used for plucking or playing with a
Speaker 1: bow represent key instruments that point towards later harps and
Speaker 1: violent type instruments. Moreover, Indian instruments from five hundred BC
Speaker 1: have been discovered with anything from seven to twenty one strings.
Speaker 1: In Vietnam, a two thousand year old singularly stringed instrument
Speaker 1: made of deer antler was also discovered. String instrument design
Speaker 1: was refined during the Renaissance and into the Baroque period
Speaker 1: sixteen hundred seventeen fifty of musical history. Violins and guitars
Speaker 1: became more consistent in design and were roughly similar to
Speaker 1: acoustic guitars of the two thousands. The violins of the
Speaker 1: Renaissance featured intricate woodwork and stringing, while more elaborate bass
Speaker 1: instruments such as the bandora were produced alongside quill plucked
Speaker 1: sitterns and Spanish body guitars. In the nineteenth century, string
Speaker 1: instruments were made more widely available through mass production, with
Speaker 1: wood string instruments a key part of orchestras. Cellos, violas,
Speaker 1: and upright basses, for example, were now standard instruments for
Speaker 1: chamber ensembles and smaller orchestras. At the same time, the
Speaker 1: nineteenth century guitar became more typically associated with six string
Speaker 1: models rather than traditional five string versions. Major changes to
Speaker 1: string instruments in the twentieth century primarily involved innovations in
Speaker 1: electronic instrument amplification and electronic music. Electric violins were available
Speaker 1: by the nineteen twenties and were an important part of
Speaker 1: emerging jazz music trends in the United States. The acoustic
Speaker 1: guitar was widely used in blues and jazz, but as
Speaker 1: an acoustic instrument, it was not loud enough to be
Speaker 1: a solo instrument, so these genres mostly used it as
Speaker 1: an accompaniment rhythm section instrument. In big bands of the
Speaker 1: nineteen twenties, the acoustic guitar played backing chords, but it
Speaker 1: was not loud enough to play solos like the saxophone
Speaker 1: and trumpet. The development of guitar amplifiers, which contained a
Speaker 1: powerful amplifier and a loud speaker in a wooden cabinet,
Speaker 1: let jazz guitarists play solos and be heard over a
Speaker 1: big band. The development of the electric guitar provided guitarists
Speaker 1: with an instrument that was built to connect to guitar amplifiers.
Speaker 1: Electric guitars have magnetic pickups, volume control knobs, and an
Speaker 1: output jack. In the nineteen sixties, larger, more powerful guitar
Speaker 1: amplifiers were developed called stacks. These powerful amplifiers enabled guitars
Speaker 1: to perform in rock bands that played in large venues
Speaker 1: such as stadiums and outdoor music festivals. String instruments can
Speaker 1: be divided into three groups. Ludes instruments that support the
Speaker 1: strings via a neck and a bowed or a gourd,
Speaker 1: for instance, a guitar, violin or sas arps instruments, second,
Speaker 1: the strings within a frame, zithers instruments that have the
Speaker 1: strings mounted on a body, frame or tube, such as
Speaker 1: a gucchin symbolum, autoharp, harpsichord, piano, or valiha. It is
Speaker 1: also possible to divide the instruments into categories focused on
Speaker 1: how the instrument is played. All string instruments produce sound
Speaker 1: from one or more vibrating strings, transferred to the air
Speaker 1: by the body of the instrument or by a pickup.
Speaker 1: In electronically amplified instruments, they are usually categorized by the
Speaker 1: technique used to make the strings vibrate, or by the
Speaker 1: primary technique in the case of instruments where more than
Speaker 1: one may apply. The three most common techniques are plucking, bowing,
Speaker 1: and striking. An important difference between boeing and plucking is
Speaker 1: that in the former, the phenomenon is periodic, so that
Speaker 1: the overtones are kept in a strictly harmonic relationship to
Speaker 1: the fundamental plucking is a method of playing on instruments
Speaker 1: such as the vina, banjo, ukulele, guitar, arp, lute, mandolin, oode,
Speaker 1: and citar, using either a finger, thumb, or quills to
Speaker 1: pluck the strings. Instruments normally played by bowing may also
Speaker 1: be plucked, a technique referred to by the Italian term
Speaker 1: pitzicato bowing. Italian arco is a messod used in some
Speaker 1: string instruments, including the violin, piola, cello, and the double
Speaker 1: bass of the violin family and the old vile family.
Speaker 1: The bow consists of a stick with a ribbon of
Speaker 1: parallel horsetail hairs stretched between its ends. The hair is
Speaker 1: coated with rosin so it can grip the string. Moving
Speaker 1: the hair across a string causes a stick slip phenomenon,
Speaker 1: making the string vibrate and prompting the instrument to emid sound.
Speaker 1: Darker grades of rosin grip well and cool dry climates,
Speaker 1: but may be too sticky and warmer more humid weather.
Speaker 1: Violin and viola players generally use harder, lighter colored rosin
Speaker 1: than players of lower pitched instruments, who tend to favor darker,
Speaker 1: softer rosin. The third common method of sound production in
Speaker 1: stringed instruments is distract the string. The piano and hammered
Speaker 1: dulcimer use this method of sound production even though the
Speaker 1: piano strikes the strings. The use of felt hammers means
Speaker 1: that the sound that is produced can nevertheless be mellow
Speaker 1: and rounded, in contrast to the sharp attack produced when
Speaker 1: a very hard hammer strikes the strings. Violin family string
Speaker 1: instrument players are occasionally instructed to strike the string with
Speaker 1: the stick of the bow, a technique called koleigno. This
Speaker 1: yields a percussive sound along with the pitch of the note.
Speaker 1: A well known use of koleigno for orchestral strings is
Speaker 1: Gustav holtz Mars movement from the Planet's Suite. Some instruments
Speaker 1: that have strings have an attached keyboard that the player
Speaker 1: presses keys on to trigger a mechanism that sounds of
Speaker 1: strings instead of directly manipulating the strings. These include the piano,
Speaker 1: the clavichord, and the harpsichord. With these keyboard instruments, strings
Speaker 1: or are occasionally plucked or bowed by hand. Modern composers
Speaker 1: such as Henry Cowell wrote music that requires that the
Speaker 1: player reach inside the piano and pluck the strings directly,
Speaker 1: bow them with bow hair wrapped around the strings, or
Speaker 1: play them by rolling the bell of a brass instrument
Speaker 1: such as a trombone on the array of strings. However,
Speaker 1: these are relatively rarely used. Special techniques. Steel stringed instruments,
Speaker 1: such as the guitar, bass, violin, et cetera, can be
Speaker 1: played using a magnetic field. An e bow is a small,
Speaker 1: hand held, battery powered device that magnetically excites the strings
Speaker 1: of an electric string instrument to provide a sustained singing
Speaker 1: tone reminiscent of a held bowed violin. Note third bridge
Speaker 1: is a plucking method where the player frets a string
Speaker 1: and strikes the side opposite the bridge. A technique is
Speaker 1: mainly used on electric instruments because these have a pickup
Speaker 1: that amplifies only the local string vibration. It is possible
Speaker 1: on acoustic instruments as well, but less effective. For instance,
Speaker 1: a player might press on the seventh fret on a
Speaker 1: guitar and pluck it at the headside to make a
Speaker 1: tone resonate at the opposing side. On electric instruments, this
Speaker 1: technique generates multi tone sounds reminiscent of a clock or bell.
Speaker 1: Electric string instruments, such as the electric guitar, can also
Speaker 1: be played with touching the strings by using audio feedback.
Speaker 1: When an electric guitar is plugged into a loud powerful
Speaker 1: guitar amplifier with a loud speaker and a high level
Speaker 1: of distortion is intentionally used, the guitar produces sustained, high
Speaker 1: pitched sounds. By changing the proximity of the guitar to
Speaker 1: the speaker, the guitarists can produce sounds that cannot be
Speaker 1: produced with standard plucking and picking techniques. This technique was
Speaker 1: popularized by Jimi Hendrix and others in the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 1: It was widely used in psychedelic rock and heavy metal music.
Speaker 1: In boat instruments, the bow is normally placed perpendicularly to
Speaker 1: the stream, at a point halfway between the end of
Speaker 1: the fingerboard in the bridge. However, different bow placements can
Speaker 1: be selected to change timbre. Application of the bow close
Speaker 1: to the bridge, known as soul ponticello, produces an intense,
Speaker 1: sometimes harsh sound which acoustically emphasizes the upper harmonics. Bowing
Speaker 1: above the fingerboard sulcasto produces a purer tone with less
Speaker 1: overtoned strings. Emphasizing the fundamental also known as flautando's since
Speaker 1: it sounds less reedy and more flute like. Boat instruments
Speaker 1: pose a challenge to instrument builders as compared with instruments
Speaker 1: that are only plucked like the guitar, because on bowed instruments,
Speaker 1: the musician must be able to play one string at
Speaker 1: a time if they wish. As such, a bowed instrument
Speaker 1: must have a curved bridge that makes the outer strings
Speaker 1: lower in height than the inner strings. With such a
Speaker 1: curved bridge, the player can select one string at a time.
Speaker 1: On guitars and ludes, the bridge can be flat. Because
Speaker 1: the strings are played by plucking them with the fingers, fingernails,
Speaker 1: or a pick. By moving the fingers or pick to
Speaker 1: different positions, the player can play different strings on bowed instruments.
Speaker 1: The need to play strings individually with the bow also
Speaker 1: limits the number of strings to about six or seven.
Speaker 1: With more strings, it would be impossible to select individual
Speaker 1: strings to bow. Boat strings can also play two boat
Speaker 1: nodes on two different strings at the same time, a
Speaker 1: technique called a double stop. Indeed, on the orchestral string
Speaker 1: section instruments, four strings are the norm, with the exception
Speaker 1: of five strings used on some double bases in contrast
Speaker 1: with stringed keyboard instruments, eighty eight courses are used on
Speaker 1: a piano, and even though these strings are arranged in
Speaker 1: a flat bridge, the mechanism can play any of the
Speaker 1: notes individually. Similar tambrel distinctions are also possible with plucked
Speaker 1: stringed instruments by selecting an appropriate plucking point, although the
Speaker 1: difference is perhaps more subtle. In keyboard instruments, the contact
Speaker 1: point along the string, whether this be the hammer, tangent,
Speaker 1: or plectrum, is a choice made by the instrument designer.
Speaker 1: Builders use a combination of experience and acoustic theory to
Speaker 1: establish the right set of contact points. In harpsichords, often
Speaker 1: there are two sets of strings of equal length. These
Speaker 1: choirs usually differ in their plucking points. One choir has
Speaker 1: a normal plucking point, producing a canonical harpsichord sound, The
Speaker 1: other has a plucking point close to the bridge, producing
Speaker 1: a reediared nasal sound rich in upper harmonics. Some instruments
Speaker 1: are employed with sympathetic strings, which are additional strings not
Speaker 1: men to be plucked. These strings resonate with splayed nodes,
Speaker 1: creating additional tones. Sympathetic strings vibrate naturally when various intervals
Speaker 1: such as the unisons or the octaves of the notes
Speaker 1: of the sympathetic strings are plucked, bowed, or struck. This
Speaker 1: system is used in the sarangi, the grand piano, the
Speaker 1: hardinger fiddle, and the rhubab. A vibrating string struck in
Speaker 1: a very thick log, as a hypothetical example, would make
Speaker 1: only a very quiet sound, So string instruments are usually
Speaker 1: constructed in such a way that the vibrating string is
Speaker 1: coupled to a hollow resonating chamber, a sound board, or both.
Speaker 1: On the violin, for example, the four strings pass over
Speaker 1: a thin wooden bridge resting on a hollow box the
Speaker 1: body of the violin. The normal force applied to the
Speaker 1: body from the strings is supported in part by a
Speaker 1: small cylinder of wood called the sound post. The violin
Speaker 1: body also has two f holes carved on the top
Speaker 1: the strings. Vibrations are distributed via the bridge and sound
Speaker 1: post to all surfaces of the instrument, and are thus
Speaker 1: made louder by matching of the acoustic impedance. The correct
Speaker 1: technical explanation is that they allow a better match to
Speaker 1: the acoustic impedance of the air It is sometimes said
Speaker 1: that the sounding board or sound box amplifies the sound
Speaker 1: of the strings. In reality, no power amplification occurs because
Speaker 1: all the energy to produce sound comes from the vibrating string.
Speaker 1: The mechanism is that the sounding board of the instrument
Speaker 1: provides a larger surface area to create sound waves and
Speaker 1: that of the string, and therefore acts as a matching
Speaker 1: element between the acoustic impedance of the string and that
Speaker 1: of the surrounding air. A larger vibrating surface can sometimes
Speaker 1: produce better matching, especially at lower frequencies. All Loote type
Speaker 1: instruments traditionally have a bridge which holds a string at
Speaker 1: the proper action height from the fratngerboard at one end
Speaker 1: of the strings. On acoustic instruments, the bridge performs an
Speaker 1: equally important function of transmitting string energy into the sound
Speaker 1: box of the instrument, thereby increasing the sound volume. The
Speaker 1: specific design and materials used in the construction of the
Speaker 1: bridge of an instrument have a dramatic impact upon both
Speaker 1: the sound and responsiveness of the instrument. Achieving a tonal
Speaker 1: characteristic that is effective and pleasing to the players and
Speaker 1: listener's ear is something of an art and craft as
Speaker 1: well as a science, and the makers of string instruments
Speaker 1: often seek very high quality woods to this end, particularly spruce,
Speaker 1: chosen for its lightness, strength and flexibility, and maple of
Speaker 1: very hardwood. Spruce is used for the sounding boards of
Speaker 1: instruments from the violin of the piano. Instruments such as
Speaker 1: the banjo use a drum covered in natural or synthetic
Speaker 1: skin as their soundboard. Acoustic instruments can also be made
Speaker 1: of artificial materials such as carbon fiber and fiberglass, particularly
Speaker 1: the larger, lower pitched instruments such as cellos and basses.
Speaker 1: In the early twentieth century, the stro violin used a
Speaker 1: diaphragm type resonator and a metal horn to project the
Speaker 1: string sound, much like early mechanical gramophones. It's use to
Speaker 1: cline beginning of nineteen twenty as electric amplification through power
Speaker 1: amplifiers and loud speakers was developed and came into use.
Speaker 1: String instrument players can electronically amplify their instruments by connecting
Speaker 1: them to a PA system or a guitar amplifier. Most
Speaker 1: string instruments can be fitted with piezioelectric or magnetic pickups
Speaker 1: to convert the string's vibrations into an electric signal that
Speaker 1: is amplified and then converted back into sound by loudspeakers.
Speaker 1: Some players attach a pickup to their traditional string instruments
Speaker 1: to electrify it. Another option is to use a solid
Speaker 1: bodied instrument, which reduces unwanted feedback how or squeals. Amplified
Speaker 1: string instruments can be much louder than their acoustic counterparts,
Speaker 1: so musicians can play them in relatively loud rock, blues
Speaker 1: and jazz ensembles. Amplified instruments can also have their amplified
Speaker 1: tone modified by using electronic effects such as distortion, reverb,
Speaker 1: or wah wah bass registers. String instruments such as the
Speaker 1: double bass and the electric bass are amplified with bass
Speaker 1: instrument amplifiers that are designed to reproduce low frequency sounds.
Speaker 1: To modify the tone of amplified bass instruments, a range
Speaker 1: of electronic bass effects are available, such as distort and chorus.
Speaker 1: The string instruments usually used in the orchestra and often
Speaker 1: called the symphonic strings or string section, are violins divided
Speaker 1: into two sections, first violins and second violins. These sections
Speaker 1: play exactly the same instruments the difference is that the
Speaker 1: first violins play higher register lines and the second violins
Speaker 1: play lower register parts, accompaniment parts or counter melodies, violas, cellos,
Speaker 1: double basses. When orchestral instrumentation specifies strings, it often means
Speaker 1: this combination of string parts. Orchestral works rarely omit any
Speaker 1: of these string parts, but often include additional string instruments,
Speaker 1: especially the concert harp and piano. In the baroque orchestra
Speaker 1: from the sixteen hundreds to seventeen fifty, or with modern
Speaker 1: groups playing early music, harpsichord is almost always used to
Speaker 1: play the basso, continual part, the written out bass line
Speaker 1: and improvised chords, and often a sciorbo or lute or
Speaker 1: a pipe organ. In some classical music, such as the
Speaker 1: string quartet, the double bass is not typically used. The
Speaker 1: cello plays the bass role in this literature,