User:Jacobdenney/sandbox

Disorganized Essay Example

I've always been interested in music, and learning about different musical instruments. When I was a kid I played clarinet in the school band, and the clarinet has been around for a long time, longer than the saxophone for instance. But clarinets aren't as old as drums. Maybe the drum was the first musical instrument. But I was never particularly interested in drumming. I don't have a good sense of rhythm. The musical instruments that I am interested in can be narrowed down to three main groups, the reed family, the string family and the percussion family.

Clarinet is a reed instrument, which is an instrument that has a reed you blow through to make the sound. Instead of a string vibrating, the reed vibrates. The clarinet dates back to the 17th and 18th century but can also be tied to a lineage going back to as late as Ancient Greece. The clarinet is a single reed instrument, and can be played when the reed is placed on the lower lip, and can be played in three different registers. When the Clarinetist plays the instrument, they blow air through the reed and down into the cylindrical bore of the instrument, and the air releases through the holes. The reed, however, is the key component due to the fact that the reed vibrates off the mouthpiece, determining how much air is going through the joints of the instrument. When the performer puts more pressure on the reed with their mouth, the reed will vibrate more and cause less air to go through the instrument, making a higher pitched tone. When they use less pressure, it will keep the reed open for a longer amount of time, making the note played at a lower tone.

I found out that instruments are grouped in families, like there is the string family, which is instruments that have strings that are bowed or plucked. One example is the violin. There have been many famous violin players, and also the violin has spread all around the world. The violin is made typically out of wood and consists of a hollow body, which also holds 4 strings, and a neck that extends the four strings out further. The strings sit on a bridge, which is an arched piece of wood that sits in the lower third of the body, that allows the strings to be in a circular pattern and and be played separately by the bow. The strings are then struck with a bow, which is a long rod which holds hairs or string, that are usually rubbed with rosin to allow the hairs to rub and "catch" on the strings of the violin. In many cases people use synthetic materials and fibers, but the more professional violinists will use horse hair, as it is a more traditional sound.

The violin is in a different family from percussion, where you hit the instrument, like how you hit a drum with a stick. One funny example is the piano. You'd think it was a string instrument, because it has strings in it, but it's a percussion instrument because the strings are hit with little hammers. Also, xylophones are percussion instruments. There are different types of xylophones that are often played including the marimba, made of wooden resonators that give it a more mellow and dull sound, and there is the glockenspiel, which uses metal keys instead of the typical wood keys. The metal keys also require the percussionist to use metal mallets, and causes the instruments to sound like little bells hitting together. Another percussion instrument played commonly is the gong. The gong dates back to ancient Asian empires and is a large brass plate that is hung from a metal pipe using string. When struck with the soft mallet required to play it, it can make a loud crashing sound when hit harder, but when hit softer will make a soft "clinking" noise.

One of instrument I know of that cant be placed in these categories is called the "glass harmonica." It was invented by Benjamin Franklin in 1761. It's a bunch of glasses that make a singing sound. I don't know what orchestra family this instrument would fit under. You don't strike it, you don't play it with a bow, and there's no reeds. Even though there are a vast number of musical instruments on this world, a majority of them can be placed into my three favorite musical instrument families.