Scan 142
The New Grove Dictionary Of Music And Musicians 5 Ed. 2nd, 1904
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1right hand, to assist, it is supposed, in the musical activity concerned with an orgy. Greek cymbals were closely associated with such rites, particularly the ancient orgiastic rites of the goddess Cybele, and the raucous rites connected with the worship of Dionysus.
3A set of cymbals from the ruins of Pompeii (in the City Museum, Pompeii) range from small crotalcs to cymbals measuring 41 cm in diameter. These instruments are said considerably to have interested Berlioz, who was certainly responsible for introducing the gentle tinkle of ancient cymbals into the orchestra. In the scherzo of his dramatic symphony Roméo et Juliette (1839) two pairs of ancient cymbals tuned a 5th apart to bb'' and f''' are needed. Debussy scored for two ancient cymbals (cymbales antiques) in e'' and b'' in Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune (1894). In Daphnis et Chloé (1912) Ravel scored for six pairs of antique cymbals with definite notes sounding b', c'', db'', e'', f'', a''
5Thanks to present-day manufacturers, chromatic scales of tuned crotalcs are readily available. In the past the parts for these instruments were often given to the glockenspiel. (When Berlioz conducted Roméo et Juliette in London no small cymbals were available, but with his usual thoroughness he persuaded a London metal founder to manufacture instruments in time for the performance.)
7For a long time cymbals, in addition to their use in religious and secular life, have been credited with remarkable powers. This subject, and the use and properties of ancient cymbals in Greek, Roman and Jewish history, are discussed at length by F. A. Lampc in De cymbalibus veterum (1700) and R. Ellys in Fortuita sacra quibus subjicitur commentarius de cymbalibus (1727).
9Cymbals closely resembling those used by the Greeks and Romans frequently appear in pictorial representations of the Middle Ages. In most cases instruments are represented as played – by angels and women generally – in the manner of ancient cymbals, i.e. horizontally, as portrayed by Matteo Giovannii (Assumption of the Virgin, late 15th century). Mersenne (1636) illustrated cymbals with straps much as we use today. Cymbals – flat and hemispherical – are illustrated in 13th-century English manuscripts. In addition to their use in Christian and pagan rites and as instruments of war, cymbals (smaller than those in the modern orchestra) were used throughout the Middle Ages by dancers and to some extent in ensemble music. They were included in the orchestra in 1680 by N. Strungk in his opera Esther, and in Freschi's opera Berenice. Cymbals were prominent instruments in the JANISSARY MUSIC of the mid-18th and early 19th centuries (fig 6). Gluck's use of cymbals in Iphigénie en Tauride excited Berlioz Mozart (Die Entführung aus dem Serail, 1782), Haydn ('Military' Symphony, 1794) and Beethoven (Die Ruinen von Athen, 1812, and the Ninth Symphony, 1823), made cunning use of cymbals with other janissary effects.
11It is from the early part of the 19th century that we find a more positive and extended use of cymbals as orchestral instruments, due in no small way to the pioneering of Berlioz. In his Grande messe des morts (1837) Berlioz scored for ten cymbals, certain of which he specified to be struck and/or sustained with soft sticks. His ideal ensemble included four pairs of cymbals (he frequently scored for more than one pair), and he scorned the combination of bass drum and cymbals played by one musician.
13Wagner's use of cymbals is exemplary. One of the finest moments for the cymbals is their first entry in the overture to Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg. There is also the truly noble effect of two loud strokes at the climax of the Lohengrin prelude. Here as in Die Meistersinger two cymbals are clashed in the normal manner. In Der Ring des Nibelungen Wagner used the mysterious ringing sound of a single cymbal, in some cases struck with a drumstick and in others with two drumsticks to produce a roll. In Das Rheingold a roll ('Becken mit Paukenschlageln') describes the glitter of the precious metal, and a similar effect occurs in the second act of Die Walkure, when Wotan utters his mysterious blessing of Alberich. Wagner also used the two-plate roll. Here a pair of cymbals are rubbed together or the edges agitated against each other. Bartók scored for this effect in his Second Violin Concerto and his Second Rhapsody for Violin and Orchestra. It also occurs in Vaughan Williams's A London Symphony. Today the roll is more generally allotted to the suspended cymbal.
15Tchaikovsky used cymbals imitatively (short notes) in the duel scene of his fantasy-overture Romeo and Juliet. The single stroke (mf) with the well-calculated vibrating period prescribed by Dvořák in his Symphony 'From the New World' is a model of economy in the use of orchestral percussion.
17Many late 19th- and 20th-century composers have made considerable demands on cymbals (and the player). In Antigone Orff requested ten pairs of cymbals. Peter Schat in Signalement wrote for 12 suspended cymbals of specified sizes. Composers such as Mahler, Strauss, Schoenberg, Bartók, Stravinsky, Bliss, Hindemith, Gerhard and Walton have requested various effects. Mahler asked for the cymbal to be struck with a steel rod in his Third Symphony. In Ein Heldenleben Strauss wrote zuschend, here usually interpreted as 'hissing'. This effect is customarily produced by the brushing of the two inner faces of the cymbals, by passing the edge of one of the cymbals swiftly across the inner face of the other; or by scraping across the striations (tone-rings) with the fingernail or a coin. Schoenberg wrote for a sustained note to be played by drawing a cello bow over the edge of a cymbal in his Five Orchestral Pieces. Bartók in his Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion required the suspended cymbal to be struck forcibly on the dome with the heavy end of a side-drum stick, and in contrast, that the instrument be struck on the very edge with the fingernail or the blade of a pocket-knife (pppp). Stravinsky frequently specified cymbal with triangle beater, e.g. in the Firebird Suite and The Wedding. Bliss asked for two cymbals, placed respectively on the heads of a pair of timpani, to be struck with hard beaters in Meditations on a Theme of John Blow. Hindemith in his Symphony in Eb (1940) somewhat anticipated the 'sizzle' cymbal of modern rhythmic groups (a suspended cymbal equipped with loose rivets or similar device) in his instruction for a cymbal to be struck with a soft stick while a thin rod is held to vibrate against the edge of the instrument.
19Further unusual effects come from Gerhard and Walton. In Hymnody (1963) Gerhard scored for the edge of a large suspended cymbal to be scraped with a threaded rod. In one of Walton's earliest works, Façade (1923), occur two novel requests: that the suspended
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