Hello,
Am 05.02.2007 um 19:47 schrieb Chris Nogy:
It seems to me that a natural transition would be to have a box
sinphone, and to make the soundbox a bit bigger, maybe flatter,
while running then into problems with how wide the keybox becomes.
Thus a reason for the first 'two piece' instrument, you get more
precision, and more ecomony of materials, in keeping your keybox
narrow as possible, and as long as you are separating the keybox
from the soundbox, you might as well make it following best
engineering practices.
So in looking for a starting point, a likely cantidate for a
transitional instrument,
To me the early single player instruments representations look more
like the transition from organistrum to modern hurdy-gurdy.
My personal speculation is that the normal string instrument with a
neck is the starting point. The fret board was replaced by a keybox.
The organistrum type is an example, as maybe are the sevral in early
(1250-1400) representations of gurdies with necks.
The idea of a box shaped instrument followed later: to make get
playability for one single player, instruments change open length of
strings needs to be shorter to get usefull key-sizes, and, a shorter
overall lenght to turn the crank with one hand and manipulate the
keys with the other (unlike the two player organistrum). So, the
keybox moved from the neck to the soundboard: this opened space for
the box idea.
kind regards,
Simon
