"Throughout human history, music has accompanied us in times of joy and in times of sorrow. This comprehensive encyclopedia is not only a reference work on musical instruments suitable for experts; it also explains the effects and expressive powers of the musical arts. The authors present the various methods of producing sound with great passion, vividly explaining how early musical inventions were scattered across the globe and how they evolved in various cultures. Clearly arranged, the structure of the book provides a quick overview of the history, symbolism, construction and playing technique of each of the instruments discussed.
The World Atlas of Musical Instruments is an indispensable reference work for every professional musician and for interested amateurs."
Review
"The World Atlas Of Musical Instruments presents a wondrous picture of our origins through the tools of their most sublime expression, as well as the evolution of that expression through the evolution of those tools."
'Atlas Of Musical Instruments' spans the world of sound
"Music was born in the human brain," begins the foreword for The World Atlas Of Musical Instruments, but human brain aside, music is expressed through the human hand and mouth.
The 320-page book beautifully centers on the hundreds of implements that have been devised by the human brain to be expressed by hand and mouth, thereby describing and depicting the world of music with over 1,000 hand-colored illustrations, plus text, photos, drawings and diagrams.
Tellingly, the picture facing the foreward shows sitar master Ravi Shankar facing off with Western violin virtuoso Yehudi Menuhin, their instruments representing the global range of those illustrated in the book. Indeed, it documents the entire history of music instruments worldwide, as organized according to geographical regions (continents and sub-continents) and time periods (antiquity, Middle Ages, Renaissance, etc.)--as well as classification by sound-producing method (blowing, bowing, striking, plucking).
The vast variety of instruments extends even to a single designation--trumpet, for example. A two-page spread in the "Europe--Romanticism" section shows that the trumpet, in that specific time/place period, was truly a category unto itself, what with 15 different types pictured, including a comparatively bizarre-looking Bach trumpet from Brussels (circa 1900), a crescent-shaped trumpet allowing the player to lower the pitch by inserting his hand mute-like into the bell (Lyon, 1820), and a 19th Century English slide trumpet.
The trumpet falls into the aerophones category, that is, instruments whose sound is generated by an air-column and including woodwinds and brass. The atlas follows the trumpets pages with three more of rare brass aerophone instruments including a tenorposaune, consisting of seven long tubes joined together in two rows, a snake-shaped serpent horn and a pair of upright straight serpents.
Likewise, the two pages of pianos found in the "Europe-Romanticsim" chapter includes a "Giraffe" piano (Amsterdam, 1810) and an upright with six rows of keys--somewhat resembling a QWERTY keyboard in appearance--a design that was soon abandoned, according to the text, "as it was not convenient to use and the pressure on the keys was uneven."
Besides the illustrations and descriptions of all these amazing historical instruments, the book offers a separate chapter on the symphony orchestra, and another on smaller orchestral, brass band and dance music ensembles. Key repertory and top virtuoso musicians and composers like Paganini, Verdi, Beethoven and Wagner are also singled out, with the final section relating to the oldest instrument of all--the human voice.
The text comes from Bozhidar Abrashev, a professor at the Pancho Vladigerov Music Academy in Sofia, Bulgaria since 1964, where he teaches symphonic orchestration and trains students in instrument making, and Vladimir Gadjev, music critic and lecturer in the sociology of music at the New Bulgarian University in Sofia.
By studying the history of musical instruments, the authors state, we can learn "a great deal about our origins, and thereby come to know ourselves better."
Indeed, The World Atlas Of Musical Instruments presents a wondrous picture of our origins through the tools of their most sublime expression, as well as the evolution of that expression through the evolution of those tools.
The amazing illustrations are by Anton Radevsky, a graduate of Berlin College of Arts.
Reviewed by Jim Bessman, Examiner.com Nov 20, 2012.
Jim Bessman, Manhattan Local Music Examiner
Jim Bessman's byline has appeared in scores of national and global trade and consumer publications. He has also authored two books and over 70 CD and box set liner notes. Follow him on Twitter @JimBessman.
