Books › Musical instruments, 1908 › scan 96
Scan 96
Musical instruments, 1908
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1Christofori's claim to the invention has been established beyond all doubt, although attempts to usurp the honor were made by the Frenchman Marius and the German Schröter. However, neither produced his invention until several years after Christofori had introduced his. In the Metropolitan Museum of Art there is one of the two existing Christofori pianofortes. It was purchased in 1895 from a Florentine family who had acquired it about 1820 at a public auction of ostensibly worthless articles from the Ducal Palace in Siena. It was retained by the family because of private associations until, in 1872, the discovery of its historical value was made. In the shape of its case it resembles a small grand piano, but it is without the pedals, which first appeared in the pianoforte made by Zumpe in 1783.
3Next to the pianoforte, the violin finds favor as an instrument of music in the home. It suffers greatly in the hands of inexperienced players, who doubtless even by study could never learn its secrets. In the East it is played by the common people to a great extent, and someone has said that civilization has followed the fiddle, referring to its extensive use in furnishing music for frontier dances. The savage who rubbed his bowstring with a piece of rough bark, in order to produce sound vibrations, was the parent of the violin. The material used in producing vibrations in strings has been changed from time to time. A successor of the rough bark was the stick, with a serrated edge. This is the most primitive form of bow which presents itself for examination by the student of today. Despite its extreme crudity, it is still found in rural France in use with the bumbass.
5The time and place of the introduction of horsehair cannot authentically be stated. The Hindus assert that King Ravanon, of Ceylon, 5000 years ago invented the ravanastron by discarding the notched stick and substituting in its stead a stick having horsehair stretched from end to end. The bow of the present ravanastron is formed from a piece of bamboo, pierced by a hole near one end. A mesh of hair is passed through, and secured with a knot, while another
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.