Term Paper on "String Instruments Has a Unique and Highly"

Term Paper 8 pages (2206 words) Sources: 0

[EXCERPT] . . . .

string instruments has a unique and highly entertaining history. One instrument stands out among established string instruments such as violins and violas. In 1823, a Viennesian by the name of Johann George Staufer developed the string instrument called "arpeggione." Staufer made the arpeggione bowed like a classic cello, however it is both fretted and tuned like a guitar. Although it is rare to see arpeggione being played today, it was popular for a time after its invention. In the below sections we will dissect the creation of the arpeggione, and why its specific qualities made it into a unique entrant into the viol family. We will also examine music that has been specifically written for the arpeggione, and how it structurally differs from traditional music.

Johann George Staufer was arguably one of the most prominent figures within Viennese guitar design within the 19th century. He made many critical contributions that are still in use today. Among them was the "Persian slipper" shape of guitar headstocks, an innovation that is still in use today on all Stratocaster electric guitars. Another of his innovations involved what is known as a flying fingerboard, which allows the artist to either raise or lower the height of the fingerboard in accordance with their taste. Staufer's shop in Vienna was highly touted for its innovation and its culmination was the development of the arpeggione. This instrument had its body shaped into a similar design as the guitar, but it was very smooth corners in contrast to traditional violin designs. The instrument also lacked an endpin, which meant that it is held between the knees like a cello. It appears that the logic behind his actions was to create a devise that utilizes the strengths of an existing plucked instrument, the viol family of instruments in this case, and makes it into a bowed instrument that could be practiced and utilized by other people. Thus the arpeggione arose out of both comfortable playing position as well as adaptation of existing instrument technology.

Although the arpeggione had a very distinctive and practical purpose, it became extinct very quickly. The reason for its demise is multifold; little of it has to do with the actual quality of the instrument. Anyone who has attempted to design and build a completely new instrument for the classical performance community will know what an uphill battle it is to establish this instrument within communities. With the arpeggione, Staufer made two very critical mistakes. The first involves the instrument's mechanics; the arpeggione had the initial intent of being a delicate instrument that could be played with ease because of its magnified length. Therefore Staufer thought of it as a transition piece between the viola and the cello. However, because traditional fretted stringed instruments have only four strings, Staufer miscalculated with the extension of the instrument's bridge curvature. As a result, the curvature was much to slight to fit the six strings in a balanced manner. Thus, performers could not apply direct pressure to a single string without touching off the adjacent strings, making distinctive pieces extremely hard to master using the arpeggione. Since this era had replaced traditional keyboard instruments such as the harpsichord with much louder instruments that often drowned out string instruments. It was necessary for most performers to convert to string instruments that had a very distinctive sound and could provide more volume than traditionally demanded. Since the arpeggione had such a delicate bridge, its volume was necessarily very low, and the absence of an endpin meant that it was extremely hard to play and hold at the same time.

Even without its mechanical shortcomings, the arpeggione was doomed from the beginning because of the changing tastes and aesthetics of the 19th century era. By this time, large fretted string instruments such as the viola da gamba were very much out of favor with most audiences. They saw such developments as arcane and wanted to place greater emphasis on the piano and other lighter instruments. Many of Staufer's contemporaries viewed the Arpeggione was distain because its sound was extremely coarse. As a result, almost no one took the effort to master the instrument and turn it into harmony. As one scholar notes "It seems with Music as with agriculture, the more barren and ungrateful the soil, the more art is necessary in its cultivation. And the tones of the viola da gamba are radically so crude and nasal, that nothing but the greatest skill and refinement can make them bearable." Since the sound of fretted instruments was out of favor in general, by the time 1823 came, there was absolutely no appreciation for the instrument that Staufer created. The focus therefore was on dynamic music, especially following Beethoven, as a result the history of music had left behind very strong coarse instruments such as those used during the traditional Baroque periods. Which meant that the dynamic and colorful musical tastes of that era excluded the arpeggione even before it was built.

Few pieces were written directly for the Arpeggione, the only one that has survived today and gained fame is the Sonata for Arpeggione written by Franz Schubert. This music itself was not published until the late 19th century in 1871. As a result, the arpeggione was never even played with this piece because it had long ceased to exist by this era. Therefore, the music was actually applied to many different stringed instruments in an attempt to reach the composition's overall range. Today it is still being performed on many different mediums, ranging from viola, cello to the classical guitar. In order to understand the composition, we have to examine its strange but compelling origins. Franz Schubert wrote many compositions within his lifetime; unfortunately none of them were even looked at, much less played, during his lifetime. He had a very bad financial sense and as a result made many decisions in both his life and musical compositions that made him practically destitute. Despite these setbacks Schubert made every attempt to gain financial success from his music, many of his works was centered on the Opera, where most composers of the day were making hefty commissions from. However, its notoriously bad business sense and self-promoting caused most of his works to be ignored, even though critics gave him compelling reviews of his music. When these ventures into the Opera world failed, Schubert became mystified; he met the criticism of his work from both critics and friends with open astonishment.

The lack of success with opera is a story that reflects on why the arpeggione sonata was written in the first place. Schubert entered into the opera scene mainly at the behest of his close friend. Schubert places a heavy emphasis on his friendships within this period and as a result, would write many of his pieces to express his devotion to friends and colleagues. Since he was a close friend Staufer, the maker of the instrument, probably requested that the sonata be written specifically for the arpeggione. There was no direct evidence that Schubert received payment or even a commission request for this piece. Therefore many contemporary critics term him the "composer of Friendship." Therefore as author Harmon Milner explains it, to understand Schubert's actual modus operandi, one must start by looking at his closest friends and colleagues, because they form the "epicenter of his motivation."

When Schubert actually began composing the arpeggione sonata, he was neither perturbed by the instrument's strange design nor its relative obscurity. He composed the sonata in 1824, one year after the instrument was conceived. Schubert's main purpose within this sonata was to exploit the opportunities of such a fretted instrument's extended range. Since the arpeggione had guitar tuning that is not evident in most traditional fretted instruments, performers could be within a range of two octaves and a fourth without having to shift or change positions. Its six stringed setup also made it very easy for virtuosic passages. Many movements within the piece itself demonstrate the flexibility of the arpeggione by dynamically ranging octaves within two or three bars. Schubert's carefully dictated the melody of this music so that it would fully utilize the strengths of the arpeggione. Indeed, this sonata would serve as a strong advertising tool for why performers should begin using the arpeggione. Unfortunately this was never used for that particular purpose, as the music was found following Schubert's death. Despite the many idiosyncrasies within the music, the actual form and structure of the sonata is very typical of Schubert's work. The music is both very emotionally volatile and tersely somber. It reflected the changes within Schubert's lifestyle, from the rowdy social bohemian lifestyle to a much more reserved character. At the time of his composition Schubert was suffering from syphilis. This severely affected the mood of his music, because both his physical and mental quality of life declined significantly because of the ill-advised treatments of the time and the general public stigma associated with the disease.

Thus the… READ MORE

How to Reference "String Instruments Has a Unique and Highly" Term Paper in a Bibliography

Related Term Papers:

Violin Stringed Instruments of Some Sort Term Paper

Violin

Stringed instruments of some sort or another have been around for millennia. There is evidence that the ancient Egyptians knew how to achieve a range of pitches using strings… read more

Term Paper 6 pages (2013 words) Sources: 1+ Topic: Music / Musicians / Instruments

---

Role of Viola Da Gamba as a Solo Instrument in the Sixteenth Century Term Paper

Viola Da Gamba

Terms, Structure, and Origins

Viola Da Gamba as a Solo Instrument

Decline of the Viola Da Gamba

ROLE OF THE VIOLA DA GAMBA AS A SOLO INSTRUMENT… read more

Term Paper 7 pages (3042 words) Sources: 0 Topic: Music / Musicians / Instruments

---

Music of Ludwig Van Beethoven Research Paper

Beethoven

The Music of Ludwig Van Beethoven

Ludwig Van Beethoven was a German composer born on December 17th, 1770. However, there is a debate about whether he was born on… read more

Research Paper 3 pages (991 words) Sources: 3 Topic: Music / Musicians / Instruments

---

Spiritual Gospel Term Paper

Spiritual Gospel Music

Once thought of as only Black Southern Christian music, gospel music has "transcended those limits to become a profound force in American music and popular culture" (Petrie… read more

Term Paper 6 pages (1914 words) Sources: 1+ Topic: Music / Musicians / Instruments

---

History Education Term Paper

Theories

Tactics

Methods and Techniques

A Specific Method

DISCUSSION, CONCLUSIONS, and RECOMMENDATIONS

Results for the Same

Examples of Voices Singing a Canon

The Project Life Cycle

Project Management Puzzle Parts… read more

Term Paper 76 pages (24173 words) Sources: 22 Style: MLA Topic: Education / Teaching / Learning

---

View 100+ more related papers  >>