Scan 232
The American History and Encyclopedia of Music, 1910
10 lines. Read by computer on 10 September 2026. Printed page 176. See the scan on archive.org.
1sound-holes it greatly resembles the violin, the finger-board is that of the zither. The strings are tuned as those of the violin, but G is the only one of the same substance as the violin, E and A being of steel, and D of brass.
3The instrument is held while playing with the head upon the edge of a table and the body in the lap of the performer. A foot attached to the head holds it steady.
5PHUNGA — Cup Mouthpiece. India. A trumpet with a long slender tube of thin metal expanding into a small bell at the end. The tube of a phunga at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is forty-nine inches long and has a diameter of two inches.
7PIAI-PAN — Sonorous Substances. China. Castanets. These consist of two small slabs of a kind of red-wood attached with a silken cord, upon which a third slab of wood is struck to beat time. It is of common use in popular orchestras.
9PIANOFORTE — Struck Strings. Europe. In the pianoforte, necessity has assuredly been the mother of invention. Since Cristofori's first instrument in 1710, each improvement has required another to counteract the change produced in the instrument's equilibrium. Cristofori's pianoforte was made entirely of wood, it was strung with poorly made wire, and the action and tone were weak and crude. The action consisted of a first or key lever depressed by the fingers and furnished with a pad which with an upward movement raised a second lever, pivoted near one end, and bearing a hopper at the other. As the first lever struck the second, the hopper was sent upward and came in contact with a projection connected with the hammer, near the circular butt upon which the hammer moved. The hammer-head was thereby sent against the string, causing it to vibrate. Beyond the point at which the second key lever was pivoted was a vertical stem, having at its extremity the damper, which rested against the string until the lever was struck, when the same motion which was transmitted to the hammer carried the damper away from the string. This is called single
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