The predicament is
in the fact that there are so many different types of instruments between our
plethora of cultures that defining classes is incredibly complicated.
The fact that the
instrument population is so dense and diverse leads me to believe that it is a
worthwhile field to study and further develop into it's own subject or
sub-field.
I believe
the classification system, if it is necessary, should be divided by
culture, not blanketed across all. Culture is a huge part of what makes an
instrument unique yet connected. By that I mean an an instrument is uniquely
connected to a single or maybe only a few cultures. Instruments often tend to be
first and foremost a reflection of a culture and many times are used to fulfill a cultural
purpose, i.e. worship, celebration, mourning..etc.
I can't imagine a
worthwhile classification system that would be comprehensive, yet concise
enough to be useful if it includes universal statements to classify all
instruments. I believe this is true unless the only type of classification being attempted is that of
a physical or tonal nature. In terms of Ethnomusicology and Organology that is
simply not thorough enough.
The most widely used
format for instrument classification, without cultural identity taken into
account, is the Hornbostel-Sachs system which categorizes instruments into five
categories: Idiophones ( sound created through the vibration of the body of the
instrument: cymbal, washboard, gong); Membranophones ( sound created by the vibration
of a membrane: drums); Chordophones ( sound created by stretched string or
strings between fixed points: cello, zither, lute); Aerophones ( sound created
by vibrating air: organ, pipe, conch shell); and Electrophones ( instruments
involving electricity: keyboard, synthesizer).
"Hornbostel and
Sachs based their ideas on a system devised in the late 19th century by Victor-Charles
Mahillon, the curator of musical instruments at Brussels Conservatory.
Mahillon divided instruments into four broad categories according to the nature
of the sound-producing material: air column; string; membrane; and the body of
the instrument. However, these categories were not new; they derive from
the Natya Sastra, a
roughly two-thousand-year-old Indian theoretical
treatise on music and dramaturgy. Mahillon
limited his system, for the most part, to instruments used in European classical
music. From this basis, Hornbostel and Sachs expanded Mahillon's
system to make it possible to classify any instrument from any culture."- Wikipedia :)
Below is a link to the
Smithsonian Sound for Global Libraries. This site uses the Hornbostel-Sachs
system to categorize instruments. It is a nice and even kind of a fun way to further
explore this form of instrument classification. Enjoy!
This chapter reminds me of the time I went to the Legion of Honor in San Francisco where they had a special exhibit on art from Oceania..among the totem poles, canoes, and shrunken heads, they also had a series of objects identified as 'instruments.' From what I saw, I have no idea how they reached this conclusion, and the little description beside the exhibit didn't offer much information. Just a memory sparked by the reading...how do they really know??
ReplyDeleteAs to the classification processes described in the chapter (such as the Hornbostel-Sachs model), this seems like just another attempt to categorize an enormous range/diversity of music that runs risk of exclusivity. It feels like setting up rules/categories after the fact (after the practices have been produced) and ignoring/underevaluating the rules that may have pre-existed and been the real foundation of the musics being studied & compared.
I think it's interesting that you say instruments should be classified by culture, it definitely makes sense. However, at what point do we draw the line between what defines different cultures? For instance, I am Vietnamese, and there are many French influences that are apparent in modern Vietnamese culture. Do we consider this as Vietnamese, or as an intrusion upon Vietnamese culture? we would need to evaluate instruments in this manner as well, since different instruments have been introduced to foreign parts of the world that previously did not have them and influenced the music produced. To classify instruments by culture would undoubtedly give meaning to them, but it would be very difficult because it would be dependent on the time era to determine what culture is related to what instrument.
ReplyDeletegood point. I suppose you could do it by whatever is extant in that culture at the time you are doing your ethnography, but that could date your ethnography pretty quickly—though that is always the problem with ethnographies I suppose.
DeleteI had thoughts similar to Amy's when I read about your idea of classifying instruments by culture. However, instead of thinking about French influences in modern Vietnamese culture, I thought about the debate in South Korea on whether Trot is truly a Korean music. In a nutshell, one side contends that Trot is Japanese and not a naturally Korean music because Trot came about sometime around the Japanese colonization of Korea and is similar in many regards to the Japanese Enka. However, with both Korea and Vietnam's cases, I would argue that these outside influences are now a part of their own culture. For Korea, it's been almost a century since the beginning of Japan's colonization, and Trot has become a large part of their music history. For many, they grew up with Trot and probably identify with it the same way one would with a "purer", "more" Korean music. When a foreign influence has evolved into something such as this, where the native culture takes it and makes it their own kind of thing, I would say it is part of their culture. That said, I agree that there any instrument classification by culture would be dependent on time era and that this would be a difficult task.
ReplyDeleteThe idea of classification of instruments by culture sounds like a good idea to me and I agree with Kevin and I believe there is a certain point where a foreign influence becomes a part of the culture. Music and culture, in my mind, don't operate in isolation from other musics and cultures. Influence from other cultures is ,therefore, unavoidable. However, the larger classifications of the Hornbostel-Sachs system, I don't think, is altogether useless. In some way it allows for a further in depth study of the instruments and how sound is produced, whether that system is particularly helpful in ethnomusicology, I'm not altogether sure.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Amy, Kevin, and Brent on this one. Although thinking about it, it would be super hard classifying instruments by culture. What is culture to begin with?
ReplyDeleteI can say that in my "culture" (Mexican) the trumpet is an instrument that is used in Banda music, but when classifying "cultures" would you say that the trumpet belongs to the Mexican Culture, because it's also widely used in Jazz and thats a culture on its own.
I know none of this probably made sense...
umm... I gave you about fifty options in class and in that link on the first blog entry :-)
DeleteManuel brings up an interesting point for the classification of instruments by culture.
ReplyDeleteThere are certain instruments that are very prominent figures within a culture's music:
Violin/Fiddle is typically associated with western classical music, but it has also grown considerably in other cultures' musics such as Irish music, folk musics of European countries, Latin American music, and now even the contemporary and pop music scene.
The use of the trumpet is also a very good example.
Where do we draw the line between what instrument is part of one's musical culture and how do we classify it as such? I actually think that the current method of instrument classification is fine because it is talking about the physical characteristics and properties of how the instruments behave in the production of sound. We can try to further classify them by groups within cultures but I feel that would be a very difficult task.
I have to say I agree with a lot of what you all have stated in terms of the classification of instruments by culture and I think this is a very interesting concept. Amy and Kevin posed some really great examples as to how you would ask and address the integration of an instrument involved within more than one culture.
ReplyDeleteIn examples of colonization or imperialism, I too questioned how you would distinguish which culture that instrument belongs to. I feel as if this cultural classification poses some challenging thoughts and ideas surrounding power, identity, and ownership within a culture. A problem I had thought that could arise out of this system is the question of whether a culture itself would "claim" the instrument as being theirs or whether or not a part of both cultures.
The acknowledgment of both cultures contributing to the instrument would address/acknowledge the power of one culture over the other at some time and the instrument as being "owned" by both. But I wonder whether the conquered (not the exact choice of words but its what I can think of right now) culture would want to acknowledge this or have a claim of its own so as to break ties with the dominant culture. By cutting ties and solely distinguishing the instrument as theirs could be seen as an assertion of power and identity ( I hope this makes sense, it sounds better in my head).
It's just interesting to me that I had never really payed much attention to the fact that I've been trained to think that certain instruments are meant for a particular gender. If someone were to ask for quick one-word responses as to who plays what instrument, followed by instrument names, I would surely say female for certain instruments (i.e. harp, flute) and male for others (i.e. tuba, double-bass) without batting an eye. Maybe actually realizing that it has been engrained in my mind a certain way will help breakdown the gender-specific stigmas and help me concentrate on more important things instead.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if in some cultures there are instruments that a particular gender actually is not allowed to play. I am thinking along the lines of cultures in which women, especially pregnant or menstruating women, are not allowed to participate in religious ceremonies, some of which, it is safe to hazard a guess, involve instruments. Would these instruments need some sort of additional footnote indicating they are a, say, male only membranophone? It starts becoming too convoluted to be worth bothering with. I agree with Eunah's comment about how going back and categorizing things after the fact is counter intuitive, and I add, borderline altogether pointless. It may help within our western art music instrumentation to identify "woodwind features" because they can help us see larger structures etc. in play in pieces due to instrumentation/color change, but I fail to see how categorizing other cultures' instruments is helpful if they never thought of them themselves in that way.
DeleteI think it is good to have a way to categorize instruments to learn how they make their sounds. Other than that, there are too many differences to effectively categorize the instruments. It seems insulting to try to categorize the instruments based on an area (i.e. Asia) because it is such a large area. Saying that an instrument is diminishing the multiple cultures in that area.
ReplyDeleteAlso, like others have pointed out, it really does depend on the time period. Different instruments are use in types of music where they don't seem to belong like the Beatles using the sitar.