Kinds of instruments

Musical instruments can be grouped in five major classes. These classes are (1) stringed instruments, (2) wind instruments, (3) percussion instruments, (4) keyboard instruments, and (5) electronic instruments.

Stringed instruments produce notes when the player makes one or more strings vibrate. There are two basic types of stringed instruments:

Bowed stringed instruments are played by drawing a bow back and forth across the strings (the violin, viola, violoncello or cello, string bass.

Plucked string instruments are played by plucking the strings with the fingers (the guitar harp, banjo, lute, lire, mandolin and others).

Wind instruments are played by using breath to vibrate air in a tube. There are two chief types:

Wood wind instruments (oboe, clarinet, flute, saxophone).

Brass instruments are made of brass (french horn, trumpet, trombone, tuba).

Percussion instruments are sounded by shaking them or by hitting them with the hand, a stick or a mallet. Drums are the most common percussion instruments. This group also includes xylophone, castanets, cymbals, gongs, triangles, tambourines.

Keyboard instruments have a series of keys connected by mechanical means to a device that produces notes. The best-known keyboard instruments are the piano, harpsichord and pipe organ.

Electronic instruments include those that generate sound by electricity and those that electronically amplify sounds produced by an instrument. Electric guitars, electric pianos are widely used in rock music. A complex electronic instrument called a synthesiser is use to create original sounds or to imitate the sounds of other musical instruments.

Stringed Percussion Keyboard Notes

Струнный Удар Клавиатура Ноты

Vibrate Bow Plucked Mallet

Вибрировать Cмычок Щипковый Молоток

Ex. 21. Describe the make-up of a symphony orchestra, brass band, jazz band, chamber ochestra.

Ex. 22. Study the text:

Classical music

Classical Style - musical language developed by Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Ludwig van Beethoven, characterized by a supreme balance of musical form and content.

The term “Classical” was applied to the music of Haydn and Mozart during the final years of the 18th century. Shortly after Mozart's death in 1791, his first biographer observed that his operas, concertos, quartets, and other works were praiseworthy because they could be listened to again and again without tiring.

An influential style dating from around 1720 was the rococo (or style galant), cultivated principally in France. The so-called expressive style arose somewhat later, and was chiefly associated with German composers. Both styles were developments of the widespread Baroque practice of placing the principal melodic interest in the outer voices. The rococo style belonged to the aristocracy, whereas the expressive style was middle-class, turning Baroque affections into sentiments of the individual. Both idioms were eventually absorbed into the Classical style.

The extent to which the Classical style survived into the 19th century is debatable. The impact of Revolutionary France brought extra-musical influences more characteristic of the Romantic period. The music of Viennese composer Franz Schubert contained a lyric impulse and wide-ranging tonal excursions within impressive large-scale structures. Within Schubert's songs a Classical regard for form mingles with an instinctive imagination more characteristic of the Romantics. Although Classical structures retained an important position throughout the 19th century, it was the forms rather than the underlying principles which survived in the work of many Romantic composers.

concerto quartet praiseworthy influential absorb idiom

Концерт Квартет Достойный похвалы Влиятельный Поглотить Идиома, стиль

impact excursion regard mingle retain

Воздействие Экскурсия, экскурс Отношение Смешаться Сохранить

Ex. 23. Answer the questions:

1. Who were the founders of the classical style?

2. What are the criteria of classical style?

3. What are the two trends of Baroque style? What are they characterized by?

4. Did the Classical style survive into the 19^th century?

Ex. 24. Study the text and answer the questions: