Unusual instruments

[ardcarp]

Here's an unusual instrument https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11d2KxBMA3s

I feel we're in the presence of greatness, Richard. Did you invent the instrument as well as composing for it? Lovely sound.

[Bryn]

I feel we're in the presence of greatness, Richard. Did you invent the instrument as well as composing for it? Lovely sound.

You have not been following what Richard has been posting here and on FB lately, have you?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angklung

[Richard Barrett]

Did you invent the instrument as well as composing for it? Lovely sound.

It's an Angklung from Indonesia, which is generally found in much smaller sets than this tuned to Indonesian scales; the 3-octave chromatic version is quite rare, at least I've only ever seen two. What Peter Neville is playing is actually not a solo piece but his part from an ensemble piece, which features other non-western instruments such as a sitar. He suggested that it would sound interesting on its own and he was right, although now I feel like it needs some additional work to turn it into a concert piece in this form.

[Jazzrook]

Harry Partch and his strange musical instruments:

https://www.YouTube.com/watch?v=m8unoRnzcPE

JR

[Quarky]

Jennifer Lucy Allan / Late Junction is fond of the foghorn::https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iHCmzvzCmhI

Can't find a composition involving a fog horn, but Earth Horns come close:: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CP5sMVLcpB0

[Nick Armstrong]

This is a new one on me:





(This is the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, apparently)

[RichardB]

This is a new one on me

If I'm not mistaken there used to be one of those in the musical instruments section of the V&A... but it may have been somewhere else... or I may have dreamed it.

[oddoneout]

This is a new one on me:





(This is the Montreal Symphony Orchestra, apparently)

Do the folk at the front of the balcony get to tune it as a perk of their seats?

[Nick Armstrong]

Do the folk at the front of the balcony get to tune it as a perk of their seats?

Courtesy of Wikipedia:

[oddoneout]

Yes, I noticed the playing mechanics, and the frets harking back to an earlier stage of the double bass development from viols. I was looking at the tuning pegs(are they actually used?) and their proximity to the balcony rather than the player.

[Bryn]

If I'm not mistaken there used to be one of those in the musical instruments section of the V&A... but it may have been somewhere else... or I may have dreamed it.

from: https://www.talkbass.com/threads/octobass.35445/

"I'm not sure if it's the same type of instrument I recall Wilson describing, but there is an oversized bass said to have belonged to Dragonetti on prominent display in the stringed instrument section of the Victoria and Albert Museum in London."

[Nick Armstrong]

I was looking at the tuning pegs (are they actually used?) and their proximity to the balcony rather than the player.

Yes indeed. This photo provides some guidance on possible tuning technique! (It doesn’t appear to be a genuine octobass though, but a stunt outsize violin…)

[Bryn]

Yes indeed. This photo provides some guidance on tuning technique!

Hmm. that instrument has one more string than the description of an octobass here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octobass

[Nick Armstrong]

Hmm. that instrument has one more string than the description of an octobass here

I think you replied before the addition of the parenthesis in my post - I had the same thought!

[vinteuil]

(It doesn’t appear to be a genuine octobass though, but a stunt outsize violin…)

... no. It has the sloping shoulders of the double-bass, octobass &c - derived from their viol ancestry : whereas your violin, viola, and other violoncelli have shoulders at right-angles to the neck

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