The Importance of Drums In Classical Music

Further Reading: Music

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Flamenco Guitar ... In contrast to the classical guitar, the flamenco is often equipped with a tap plate (a golpeador), commonly made of plastic, similar to a pick guard, whose function is to protect the body of the guitar from the rhythmic finger taps, or golpes. Even so, a well used Flamenco guitar only survives so long before the constant "golpes" wear through the top...

Vibrato Systems For Guitar ... Since the regular appearance of mechanical vibrato systems in the 1950s, they have been used by many guitarists, ranging from the gentle inflections of Chet Atkins to the exaggerated twang effects of early rocker Duane Eddy to the buoyant effects of surf music aficionados like The Ventures, The Shadows and Dick Dale to art rock innovator Frank Zappa...

Quidam ... The entire show is imagined by a bored young girl named Zoé who is alienated and ignored by her parents. She dreams up the whimsical world of Quidam as a means of escaping the monotony of her life...

History Of The Classical Guitar ... Alonso Mudarra's Tres Libros de Música en Cifra para Vihuela, (Sevilla, 1546) included music for both solo vihuela and solo four-course guitar...

Cirque Du Soleil ... Initially named Les Échassiers, they toured Quebec in 1980 as a performing troupe and encountered financial hardship that was relieved by a government grant in 1983 as part of the 450th anniversary celebrations of Jacques Cartier's discovery of Canada. Le Grand Tour du Cirque du Soleil was a success in 1984, and after securing a second year of funding, Laliberté hired Guy Caron from the National Circus School to re-create it as a "proper circus"...

Bass Drum ... The type usually seen or heard in orchestral, ensemble or concert band music is the orchestral, or concert bass drum (in Italian: gran cassa, gran tamburo)...

Resonator Guitar ... Resonator guitars are of two styles: Square necked guitars designed to be played in steel guitar style. Round necked guitars, which may be played in either the conventional classical guitar style or in the lap steel guitar style...

Guitar Tunings ... In some regions of Europe, especially Germany, Serbia and Poland, and in Russia and Ukraine, where classical musicians use the German system, the B natural is indicated with the letter H: in music notation, H is B♮ (B natural) and B is B♭ (B flat)...

School Band ... School bands tend to be more common in the United States than others due to a vast increase in funding to music education in recent years... Middle school bands Although some children learn an instrument prior to entering a middle school (or junior high), students in music education programs within the United States and Canada generally start daily band classes in the 6th or 7th Grade... These bands are given easy but challenging music to learn, often with many duplicate parts and simple rhythms...

Ride Cymbal ... The ride can fulfill any function or rhythm the hi-hat does, with the exclusion of an open and closed sound. Terminology The term ride means to ride with the music, describing the cymbal's sustain after it is struck...

Wintuk ... Music The music of Wintuk was composed by Simon Carpentier, who also composed the music of Cirque du Soleil's 2003 production Zumanity...

3rd Bridge ... Third bridge instruments can be custom-made by experimental luthiers (as with guitars designed and played by Hans Reichel); modified from a non-third bridge instrument (as with conventional guitars modified with a pencil or screwdriver under the strings); or may take advantage of design quirks of factory-built instruments (as with the Fender Jazzmaster, which has strings that continue from the "standard" bridge to the tremolo piece). Perhaps the best-known examples of this technique come from No Wave artists like Glenn Branca and Sonic Youth...

Fill (music) ... most fills are simple in structure and short in duration" Each type of popular music such as funk, country, and metal has characteristic fill passages, such as short scalar licks, runs, or riffs... "Although it is a small break in the pattern, the tempo is not changed at all, and in most instances the time-keeping pattern is resumed immediately after the fill. An important point to remember is that the flow of the music should not be sacrificed to the technicality of the fill." Tradition and improvisation In some styles, such as jazz or jazz fusion, musicians have more freedom to improvise fill passages each time a piece or songs is performed...

Archtop Guitar ... Typically, an archtop guitar has: 6 strings An arched top and back, not flat Moveable adjustable bridge F-holes similar to members of the violin family. Humbucker pickups...

Marching Band ... As musicians became less important in directing the movement of troops on the battlefield, the bands moved into increasingly ceremonial roles - an intermediate stage which provided some of the instrumentation and music for marching bands was the modern brass band, which also evolved out of the military tradition...

Tenor Guitar ... Almost all the major guitar makers, including Gibson, Martin, Epiphone, Kay, Gretsch, Guild and National, have manufactured tenor (and plectrum) guitars as production instruments at various times. In collaboration with Cliff Edwards, Dobro built the four-stringed round-bodied resonator tenor scale length instrument called the Tenortrope in the early 1930s...

Russian Guitar ... The invention of the Russian guitar is attributed to Andrei Sychra, who also wrote a method for the instrument, as well as over one thousand compositions, seventy-five of which were republished in the 1840s by Stellovsky, and then again in the 1880s by Gutheil. Some of these were published yet again in the Soviet Union in 1926...

Classical Guitar ... (The flamenco guitar is derived from the modern classical, but has differences in material, construction and sound) The name classical guitar does not mean that only classical repertoire is performed on it, although classical music is a part of the instrument's core repertoire (due to the guitar's long history); instead all kinds of music (folk, jazz, flamenco, etc.) are performed on it...

Classical Guitar Repertoire ... Baroque era See also: Baroque and Baroque music Baroque music describes an era and a set of styles of European classical music which were in widespread use between approximately 1600 to 1750 (see Dates of classical music eras for a discussion of the problems inherent in defining the beginning and end points)... This era is said to begin in music after the Renaissance and to be followed by the Classical music era... The original meaning of "baroque" is "irregularly shaped pearl", a strikingly fitting characterization of the architecture and design of this period; later, the name came to be applied also to its music...

Chitarra Battente ... Locals refer to the instrument, simply, as the "guitar," using the term “French guitar” for what is general called elsewhere “guitar,” meaning the classical guitar. That designation of “French” is almost certainly wrong, since all reliable sources claim a Spanish origin for the modern six-string six-course classical guitar...

Snare Drum ... It is the centre of the drum kit, the most prominent drum in most marching and stage bands, and the drum that students of both orchestral and kit drumming learn to play first. The snare drum is almost always double-headed, with rattles {called snares) of gut, metal wire or synthetics stretched across one or both heads...

Guitar ... Acoustic guitars (and similar instruments) with hollow bodies have been in use for over a thousand years. There are three main types of modern acoustic guitar: the classical guitar (nylon-string guitar), the steel-string acoustic guitar, and the archtop guitar...

Drum Kit ... More specifically, a modern drum kit (for a right handed player), as used in popular music, taught in many music schools, and for which qualifications are available from Trinity College London consists of: A snare drum, mounted on a specialised stand, placed between the player's knees and played with drum sticks (which may include rutes or brushes)... In some styles of music particular extensions are normal, for example double bass drums in heavy metal music... On the other extreme but more rarely, some performers omit elements from even the basic setup, again particularly for particular styles of music...

Steel-string Acoustic Guitar ... The most common type can be called a flat-top guitar to distinguish it from the more specialized archtop guitar and other variations. The standard tuning for an acoustic guitar is E-A-D-G-B-E (low to high), although many players, particularly fingerpickers, use alternate tunings (scordatura), such as "open G" (D-G-D-G-B-D), "open D" (D-A-D-F♯-A-D), or "drop D" (D-A-D-G-B-E)...

Musical Instrument ... The date and origin of the first device considered to be a musical instrument is disputed. The oldest object that some scholars refer to as a musical instrument, a simple flute, dates back as far as 67,000 years...

Further Reading: Drums

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Percussion Mallet ... A smaller-sized orchestra for this time period (of about fifty players or fewer) is called a chamber orchestra. A full-size orchestra (about 100 players) may sometimes be called a "symphony orchestra" or "philharmonic orchestra"; these modifiers do not necessarily indicate any strict difference in either the instrumental constitution or role of the orchestra, but can be useful to distinguish different ensembles based in the same city (for instance, the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra)...

Crash Cymbal ... Although crash cymbals range in thickness from paper-thin to very heavy, all crash cymbals have a fairly thin edge. They are typically 14 to 18 inches (36 to 46 cm) in diameter, but sizes down to 8 inches (20 cm) and up to 24 inches (61 cm) are manufactured...

Sizzle Cymbal ... The term beater is slightly more general; A mallet is normally held in the hand while a beater may be foot or mechanically operated, for example in a bass drum pedal; Drum stick is less general still, but still applied to a wide range of beaters. Some mallets, such as a triangle wand, are normally used only with a specific instrument, while others are used on many different instruments...

Drum Hardware ... Spurs, casings, lugs, tuning screws Snare tensioner Snare drums will often have a "strainer" on one side and a "butt plate" on the other to hold the snare wires to the drumhead... Traditionally, smaller tom-tom drums are supported by mounts and known as hanging toms, while snare drums rest on a stand not attached to the drum, and floor toms and bass drums rest on their own legs... Some manufacturers such as Tama Drums and Gibraltar Hardware even produce a single fitting that can be used either singly as a hanging tom mount, or in sets of three to attach the floor tom legs...

Mystère (Cirque du Soleil) ... These rattles have two main effects on the tone of the cymbal: Most obviously, the sound of the 'wash' of the cymbal is made louder and more penetrating, and is dominated by the sound of the rattles themselves. Also important but less obvious, the cymbal loses some of its sustain and dynamic range, because whenever there is insufficient energy left in the cymbal to lift the rattles, the sound cuts out sharply...

Effects Cymbal ... This classification is widely accepted but enigmatic. When pang and swish cymbals are used as ride cymbals they are not considered effects cymbals, despite their exotic tone...

Orchestra ... The most commonly used system in use in the west today divides instruments into string instruments, wind instruments and percussion instruments. However other ones have been devised, and some cultures also use different schemes...

Cymbal Stand ... The floor toms are the lowest tuned drums played with sticks in the regular 5 piece drum set. Common sizes are 16x16, that is, 16 inches (41 cm) in both depth and diameter...

Hi-hat ... Drop-clutches are also used to lock and release hi-hats while both feet are in use playing double bass drums...

China Cymbal ... Gong bass drums were first produced by Tama in the late '70s, and have since been used by artists such as Billy Cobham, Neil Peart of Rush, Stewart Copeland of The Police, Tim Alexander of Primus, Mike Portnoy of Dream Theater, Simon Phillips of Toto, David Silveria of KoRn, Aaron Gillespie of Underøath, Dominic Howard of Muse, Zac Farro formerly a member of Paramore, Budgie of Siouxsie and the Banshees... Pearl's similar suspended bass drums have been used by Chris Slade formerly of AC/DC and Joey Jordison of Slipknot... Gong bass drums are usually relatively large, and are most frequently found in 20" and custom ordered 22" diameters...

Matched Grip ... In the matched grip each hand holds its stick in the same way, whereas in the traditional grip, each hand holds the stick differently. Almost all commonly used matched grips are overhand grips...

Grip (percussion) ... For some instruments, such as triangles and large gongs, only one mallet or beater is normally used, held either in one hand, or in both hands for larger beaters; For others such as snare drums often two beaters are used, one in each hand...

Electronic Drum ... Electronic drums history It is said that the first electronic drum was created by Graeme Edge, drummer of The Moody Blues, in collaboration with Sussex University Professor Brian Groves...

Floor Tom ... China type cymbals typically have a bell that is cylindrical or shaped like a truncated cone with its base the top of the bell, an outer rim that is turned up in the reverse direction to the main bow of the cymbal, little or no taper (change in thickness) from bell to rim, and an area including the inside of the bell that is unpolished. However some china type cymbals have only some or in some cases none of these distinguishing characteristics...

Tom-tom Drum ... Although "tom-tom" is the British term for a child's toy drum, the name came originally from the Anglo-Indian and Sinhala; the tom-tom itself comes from Asian or Native American cultures. The tom-tom drum is also a traditional means of communication...

Drum Stick ... Specialised beaters used on some other percussion instruments, such as the metal beater or wand used with a triangle, and particularly beaters or mallets used with tuned percussion such as xylophone and tympani, are not normally referred to as drum sticks. Drum sticks generally have all of the following characteristics: They are normally supplied and used in pairs...

Drum Screen ... Drum screens are usually made out of a 0.22-inch (5.6mm) thick clear perspex sheet material. In parts of the US, the transparent material used is sometimes called acrylic...

Gong Bass Drum ... They can be tuned quickly by rotating the head, which sits in a threaded metal ring. Rotation raises or lowers the tension hoop relative to the rim, which increases or decreases the pitch of the drum by increasing or decreasing the tension of the drum head...

Rototom ... Treasure Island picked up the show three years later. This opportunity offered some new creative territory for Cirque du Soleil...