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The most vexed question in collections of historic musical instruments
is the extent to which the instruments should actually be used for
their original purpose, making music. If they are not played at all,
much of the benefit of preserving them remains unrealised; if they are
played, the necessary prior restoration and the very act of use imposes
loads and risks that are generally not compatible with proper standards
of conservation. A playing regime for an instrument is not sustainable.
The policy of most specialist museums of instruments has been to
encourage the copying by appropriately skilled makers of instruments in
their collections, in the hope that the copies will give a useful
representation of the acoustical and performance characteristics of the
original instrument, with the advantage that it can be subjected to the
demands of practice and public performance. Yet there is widespread
doubt about the success, and even the museological validity, of the
copying process.
In July 1993, the CIMCIM committee meeting in Antwerp included papers
invited from members on the theme `Copies of instruments with museum
value'. The aim was to bring together members' experiences with copies
of museum instruments and to explore the philosophical and technical
problems of copying. The meeting was organised by Jeannine
Lambrechts-Douillez, past-President of CIMCIM.
CIMCIM is publishing nine of the papers presented, together with the
organiser's introduction, as a contribution to good museum practice,
not only in members' museums, but also in other museums where there may
be only one or two musical instruments and no specialist curator.
The main aims in building copies can be (a) to provide good instruments
that serve music as it was written by composers, without transcription
or adaptation to more recent instruments, and (b) to add to our
knowledge of the construction of original instruments. CIMCIM has
discussed the problem of the preservation of historic instruments and
has published its findings in two publications, Recommendations for
Regulating the Access to Instruments in Public Collections and
Recommendations for the Conservation of Musical Instruments: an
Annotated Bibliography. In order to limit the use of historic
instruments and the inevitable wear and attendant risk of damage,
CIMCIM in these Recommendations (and other authorities) advocates the
making of good copies. Some such policy is particularly necessary as
`early music' flourishes and performers and audiences alike come to
expect the use of `authentic' instruments. This meeting sought to
examine the degree to which copies of original instruments can succeed.
Obviously there is no such thing as an `exact' or `accurate' copy.
Terms discussed at the meeting included `facsimile', `reconstruction',
`reproduction', and `counterfeit' as opposed to `authentic', `period'
or `original' instruments. It was suggested by some that instead of
calling an instrument a copy, it should be called an instrument `after
Ruckers', `after Dulcken' etc.; it is clearly nonsense for a maker to
claim that he is `building a Ruckers'. Good new instruments can to a
large extent be inspired by historic instruments while being adapted to
the needs of the customer and present-day conditions. When a particular
museum instrument has served as a model for a new instrument, the
museum should be given due credit in any description of the copy
without, of course, implying that the museum endorses the new
instrument as an exact copy.
More accurate copies can only be made by mastery of earlier techniques,
and then only under certain conditions. It is not always sufficient to
have seen the original instrument and studied the drawings and other
documentation: further study may need to be made of the instrument and
of similar instruments of the same maker or period. One of the tasks of
a museum is to provide as much accurate information as possible about
its instruments. Unfortunately, museums do not have sufficient
financial means or enough trained staff to provide complete
information. Thus, museum documentation is not always sufficient for a
maker to create an instrument which plays and sounds well. Organising
the data required to make a historically-informed instrument is a very
complex operation even when only one maker of the type and period of
the instrument is involved, even then some makers were more
experimental than others. The task of a good builder is to transform
physical materials into satisfying tonal characteristics. Measurements
documented during restoration of original instruments are rarely
adequate for the purposes of making a copy. An important role for
museums is in encouraging co-operation among makers of historical
instruments.
It is becoming increasingly accepted that museums should make copies of
their own instruments, and parts of instruments, so that an impression
of the sound of an original can be given while preserving it. It can
also be valuable for educational purposes for a museum to acquire
copies of instruments in other collections. Museums with their own
laboratories can create copies under optimal conditions; other museums
have to commission private makers to provide copies.
A major limitation on the accuracy of copies is that the same materials
cannot always be used, particularly when the original instrument
incorporates materials obtained from endangered species. In choosing
the materials for a copy, the limits of authenticity should be defined.
Ever since people were keen on collecting musical instruments, they
also cared about the origin of these artifacts. Yet for a long time,
the original condition of an instrument was of little or no interest to
musicians and to music listeners. This attitude has quite substantially
changed over the past two or three decades. Nowadays baroque music is
almost exclusively performed on so-called `original instruments'.
I assume all listeners with experience of western classical music have
a vague idea of what `original instruments' are. They all know that
these instruments produce a sound distinctly different from that of
those instruments played upon in symphony concerts and the like. The
listeners have a pre-determined expectation of how the instruments will
sound when they are considered original. Also within the museum world,
curators and restorers have a rather strict idea of it. Still, there is
no common agreement about what `original instruments' are and how they
differ from normal instruments. The term and its common usage are more
problematic that we all might think at first thought.
Three questions arise for discussion:
All three meanings have little to do with what is meant by `original
instruments'. Only the first definition of `that existed at first'
makes sense if we refer to the relation between the period in which the
composition was written and the period in which the instrument was
made. Only such a time-interdependency would make sense. Accordingly,
the English prefer the term `period instruments' which has taken the
place of `original instruments' in organological and musicological
writing. `Period instruments' was formed in analogy to period furniture
in the meaning of any specified portion or division of time: a term
which creates a sensible relation between the composition and its
instrumental medium without dealing with too much ideology. On the
other hand, the English and Americans like to speak of `authentic
performances' and `authentic instruments' - a somewhat unlucky use of
this adjective.
The ideas of what `original instruments' are have changed over the
years. Already back in the 1930s this phrase was used to distinguish
certain stylistically advanced performances. Yet it was used in a very
general meaning. What was meant by `original instruments' were those
types of instruments pre-classical compositions were written for as
opposed to symphonic transcriptions of those compositions. Thus,
harpsichord as opposed to pianoforte. In those times, the alternative
was transcription or non-transcription. And the non-transcription was a
performance on `original instruments'.
Hand in hand with the belief in the truth of Urtext there developed a
fetishism for `original instruments'. Performing `early music' became
determined more and more by the prestigious object in the hands of the
musician, and the sonority of the specific instrument became an
important point of consideration for judging a performance. A case in
point is the harpsichord, where regional schools of harpsichord making
have been pointed out by scholars and musicians as being important for
the respective compositions. On the other hand, no one has as yet
questioned the validity of a certain school of violin-making for a
given style of composition. I do not know of any musician who cares
whether he should use a Stradivari or a Stainer violin as the
historically appropriate instrument for performing Bach. Part of
today's ideal of the sound of `original instruments' is a certain noisy
quality. The `original instrument' fetches back that individual
sensuality of the timbre which has been lost by the modern instrument's
timbre during its long progression towards mechanization.
Thanks to organological scholarship our thoughts about `original
instruments' have been narrowed down in the course of the last decades.
Today, we should distinguish between five categories of `original
instruments'. These are categories that cannot clearly be separated,
however.
The idea of `original instruments' is strongly connected to the idea of
authenticity in musical performance. After all, musical instruments are
not merely objects for trading or collecting, but have a specific use
within music. I want to discuss the `original instruments' within the
framework of music-making. Let me talk about a musician for whom
`original instruments' are of utmost importance. There are several
reasons for such an attitude. In general, the musician wants to apply
objective criteria for his performance within a historical context. It
is his legitimate goal to transform the score into sound in an
unadulterated manner. Concepts of Urtext, Werktreue and
authenticity are part of this approach. Yet there are very few
objective criteria, objective points of reference. The one which seems
to be the least problematic, is the historical musical instrument, in
other words the `original instrument'. It is thus the basis of any
historically oriented performance practice, and its aesthetic
foundation is the notion that every composition is an expression of its
time and can thus be interpreted adequately only with the means of its
time.
The instruments from the realm of a given composition can undoubtedly
give us historical and aesthetic findings which otherwise we can gain
only theoretically. Yet important features of the instrument have
always been kept variable, they needed and continue to need a
subjective fixing by the musician or his instrument-maker or restorer.
In the case of the string instrument the bow is the important link
between the player and the instrument, its choice influences the sound
and the instrumental virtuosity. The strength and material of the
strings can hardly be selected according to a fixed historical source,
and neither bridge nor sound post can be chosen according to a
definitive historical model. All the same, these are the parts which
the violin-maker selects and fixes in accordance with the performer's -
not the composer's - idea of how his instrument should sound. The
fundamental problem lies in the opinion that the `original instrument'
should be more than the basis for the reconstruction of a historically
correct performance, and it lies in the fact that this opinion does not
take into account that the musical instrument is no more than the
concrete relic of an anthropological system with socio-cultural
components. That object which we traditionally call a `musical
instrument' and look at as such in a museum is mere matter with a
certain material value and a certain market value. It is in itself not
a document of a vanished musical culture. Only in co-ordination with
the musician does it becomes an anthropological system. For centuries,
this anthropological system has been made up of a clearly defined
interdependency between composition, instrumentation, and habitat. The
habitat was an acoustical as well as involving the social parameter of
music-making. Woodwind and brass were preferably used for outdoor
events, because their sound carries better than that of string
instruments. The clavichord, as the instrument for the solitary player,
stood in a chamber, the spinet in the drawing room, and the harpsichord
in a hall. The word `chamber music' originally referred to privately
organized music-making in aristocratic houses and not to a
classification according to the number of instruments used. Whenever a
composition was performed within a habitat different from that one it
was intended for, musicians used to transcribe it for a different set
of instruments. Seen in this perspective, the Bach transcriptions of
the early 20th century, such as those by Stokowski, Schoenberg and
others, become aesthetically compelling.
This has changed considerably due to modern media. Since the advent of
electrical reproduction, that is since the end of the 1920s, music-
making has more and more departed from this, its original habitat. This
is specially true for the acoustical room. It is an a-historic as well
as aesthetically insensitive opinion to believe that neutral acoustics
would present an optimum acoustical surrounding for the presentation of
historical instruments. Such opinion eliminates an important component
of the anthropological system with direct acoustical implications.
Musical instruments are not simply objects in themselves. This
distinguishes them from many other objects of art. They are by
definition foremost tools. Only in the hands of a musician do they
obtain a musical function. Otherwise they will be degraded to dead
objects. It is this interlacing with the human acting, which the
musical instrument shares with the ordinary tool. And this is a reason
of the impossibility to display music as such in a museum. The intimate
relationship between the instrument and its player makes it impossible
for the musical instrument to serve as a definitive sound producing
object of a lost time. Music as sound consists of an anthropological
system in which the musical instrument is only a link in a chain of
links influencing each other. Strangely, performing on `original
instruments' can only be perfect within its electro-acoustical chain of
transmission. Because when we listen to `original instruments' through
loudspeakers, all the former considerations of the appropriate sound
for the given habitat (and vice versa) can be neglected. This reduces
the original network of references for the `original instruments'.
What are the consequences within the museum world that can be drawn
from these considerations? If one wants to display as much as
possible of this anthropological system it is important to show the
mutual relations between musical instrument and man. I will give you an
example for this:
In April 1984, Sotheby's offered for sale a violoncello which had been
made around 1800 out of a then a hundred years old viol. This had been
a quite normal procedure as you know. What made this 'cello special,
however, was that it did not hide its origin. Pieces of wood had been
added to the hanging shoulders of the viol's body, and in later years
nobody had cared to re-build it towards its original state. Within a
museum such an instrument would be the ideal object for the dynamics of
musical instrument making. There was a time not too long ago when
restorers and scholars thought such a bastard ought to be reconstructed
to its original state. Yet a viol transformed to a cello owing to the
changing world of music-making is more authentic than any object re-
built according to the intolerance of nostalgia.
This said, I think a museum should try to open the eyes of its
visitors. And it is a museum's task to display musical instruments as
testimonies of the various historical layers that form the
anthropological system of music-making. Under such conception all kinds
of `original instruments' have their place as long as they are examples
taken from the actual musical life and not from an idealistic, yet
irrelevant museum culture. A museum of musical instruments is much more
than a gallery of beautiful objects of art. It is always the attempt to
visualize the dynamics of history. Historical instruments in their
original state are part of this history as well as transformed
instruments, reproductions, true copies, and even counterfeits.
Pretence, however, should come in only within an exhibition about
museum conceptions when pretence as such becomes the expressed theme of
the exhibition.
There is something about a copy that is disdained. Copying is in many
instances regarded as unethical or even illegal, as in cases of
copyright or patent infringement. With works of art, copying their
essential nature is usually regarded as impossible. The same attitude
often prevails with musical instruments, which are what one might call
works of `high craft.' Certainly none of us would pay nearly as much
for a copy of a Stradivarius violin or of a Ruckers harpsichord - even
a very fine sounding copy - as we would pay for even a poorly preserved
original instrument by these makers.
Nevertheless, the practice of copying pre-existing works of art or
craft has a long and distinguished history. Even if Roman copies of
Greek sculpture are generally regarded as inferior to the originals,
they are still regarded as worthy of collection, preservation, display,
study, and appreciation. One of the most memorable works of art to
which I was exposed as a youth was a sculpture of a horse that was kept
on a table in my school lounge. This was a modern cast of a work in the
Metropolitan Museum in New York, which is now thought itself to be to
be a Roman copy of a lost Greek original. Copies of this and hundreds
of other works remain on sale in that Museum's gift shop. In some
instances copies of certain objects are frankly displayed in modern
museums, for example, casts of the reverse of coins or medals of which
only the obverse sides can be seen directly.
Closer to the period from which come most of the musical instruments
that we so admire today, artists of the Renaissance copied classical
originals. In 1779 Josiah Wedgwood wrote in a catalogue of his ware
that `nothing can contribute more effectively to diffuse a good taste
through the arts than the power of multiplying copies of fine things
...; by which means the public eye is instructed, bad and good works
are nicely distinguished, and all the arts receive improvement.' A
similar educational rationale was often stated when modern museums were
founded in the nineteenth century. The original objects or plaster
casts of classical sculpture displayed therein were intended to inspire
the work of contemporary artists and artisans. Thus, viewed
historically, there have seldom been serious ethical qualms about the
making of copies or about working in past styles. The question, in
practical terms, is not whether to copy or even why to copy but rather
how to copy.
Before proceeding further, a few definitions are in order. In our
wonderful English language, which is estimated to have about twice the
vocabulary of other languages, for any concept there is usually a large
group of synonyms or near synonyms with subtly different meanings. Of
the many words commonly used to describe objects that are modelled
after pre-existing objects three are: Copy, Reconstruction, and
Replica. The Oxford English Dictionary defines Replica as `A copy,
duplicate, or reproduction of a work of art; properly, one made by the
original artist.' The word is correctly used by art historians, for
example, to describe the paintings of `St. Luke Drawing the Virgin' in
Munich, St. Petersburg, and Lichtenstein judged to have been executed
by Rogier van der Weyden or at least by apprentices or journeymen under
his direction. These replicas are later versions of the original in
Boston. If someone had reproduced the painting in the seventeenth
century or if someone paints a version tomorrow they cannot be
replicas: Rogier van der Weyden, the original artist, died long before.
The word replica is often used by instrument makers and musicians who
speak of making or playing modern `replicas' of instruments by Ruckers,
or Anton Walter, or whoever, but it should be understood that this is a
vulgar misuse of the term. Indeed, it should not be applied at all to
musical instruments, which cannot be regarded as unique works of art in
quite the same way as paintings. It would be ludicrous to maintain that
Laux Maler made one original lute and then spent the rest of his life
making replicas of it.
Recently, at a professional meeting I heard someone refer in a paper to
a modern `replica' of Hans Haiden's Geigenwerk, no example of which
has survived. Almost as bad a usage of a related word is found in a
record advertisement which states that the performer of the medieval
Cantigas de Santa Maria plays `copies of European instruments of the
time such as they can be seen on the miniatures illustrating the book
of Cantigas.' A copy of an instrument shown in the Cantigas
manuscript would, of course, be a miniature painting, not an actual
instrument. The proper word for instruments made according to verbal
descriptions or ichnographical evidence is `reconstruction.' Francis W.
Galpin, for example, made a reconstruction of a Roman hydraulis.
A reconstruction need not even be made as a functioning instrument. My
forthcoming catalogue of the keyboard instruments at the Museum of Fine
Arts in Boston includes several drawings that show the presumed
original states of instruments that have been altered: for example, a
Neapolitan harpsichord of about 1550, in the drawing of which the nuts,
soundboard ribs, and 4' bridge and hitch-pin rail are based on evidence
such as glue marks and scratched lines. Such a drawing can itself be
called a reconstruction of the instrument's original state. If one were
so ill-advised as to restore this instrument to its original state, the
new nuts, 4' bridge, ribs, etc., that one would have to make would also
properly be called reconstructions of the individual components.
An object made more or less accurately according to a pre-existing
model that has been made by someone else is properly called a copy.
With many artistic objects, copying can be a rather straightforward
process. The most significant characteristics of a work of visual art
are primarily superficial. A sculpture can be reproduced by making a
cast, a painting by applying a few layers of paint to a canvas or
panel. In many cases, adequate results can be attained by the copyist
without even using the same materials as those found in the original.
The copying of musical instruments is far more complex. The primary
intention is usually to reproduce subtle acoustical and mechanical
characteristics, not merely surface appearances. From the musical and
organological standpoint, it is not necessary to reproduce the purely
decorative elements of the original model unless these can be regarded
as having some conceivable influence on tone or function. Thus, for
example, it hardly matters what colour one paints a harpsichord case.
The underlying materials and dimensions of the components of the case
are far more important. On the other hand, the rose in the soundboard,
while certainly decorative, can be regarded as having some influence on
the acoustics of the soundboard; similarly, the applied mouldings
around the edges of an Italian harpsichord can be regarded as
structural as well as decorative. Such elements should of course be
included in any serious copy (although, needless to say, the original
maker's initials in a Flemish or French harpsichord rose should be
altered or omitted).
Let us take as given that the intention in copying a chosen
pre-existing instrument is to reproduce its sound and touch as
accurately as possible. The reasons for attempting to do this are
various. A modern violin maker, for example, will wish to copy an Amati
or Strad not because it is old but because its tonal characteristics
are such that would be useful to a modern violinist playing the
mainstream concert repertoire. To violin makers and their customers it
is primarily the present state of the original that matters. A very
fine copyist might attempt to reconstruct and to follow the working
methods of the original master but will then proceed to patinate the
copy, wear down the edges, and set it up as a modern violin. A lute
maker, on the contrary, will copy a certain lute not because it is
known to sound good - in all likelihood the original is unplayable -
but because it is old and the copy can be used to perform old lute
music in what is thought to be an authentic manner.
In either case of the violin or the lute maker, or, to introduce some
cultural diversity, likewise in the case of someone wishing to copy the
instruments of a gamelan for the performance of Javanese music, the
assumption is that it is indeed possible to reproduce the musical
characteristics of the original. It is by no means easy to prove that
this can be done. `The proof of the pudding is in the tasting,' but
here we must compare two puddings, one of which is two or three hundred
years old. Things are, to be sure, easier with the copy of the
modernized old violin: because the intention is to reproduce the
original as it now is, the copyist's success can, in theory at least,
be judged by a direct comparison. The original instrument can be
regarded as the scientific control, and the testing can even be blind.
Nevertheless, even if the two instruments are perceived as identical at
first, the possibility remains that the copy will change as it begins
to age and that a comparison a year or ten years later will begin to
reveal differences.
In the case of the lute or that of almost any historical instrument,
the scientific control does not exist. Even if the original is
playable, age, damage, alteration, or restoration can be assumed to
have changed its touch and tone from what they were when the instrument
was new. Further, the copying of almost any antique instrument involves
some reconstruction. An original Renaissance lute will usually have
been enlarged with extra courses of strings, a process involving
replacement of the bridge, neck, and peg box; the copyist might well
wish to make the copy as a reconstruction of the original state. A
clavichord maker will have to reconstruct the proper tightness of
balance mortices in the key levers. A woodwind maker will reconstruct
the surmised original bore, circular in cross section, not elliptical,
as the bore in the original almost certainly has become.
Plausible practical solutions to such problems of reconstruction are
usually possible, but the questions remain: Is it possible to copy?
That is, can the qualities of a copy reasonably be assumed to match
those of an unheard, unplayable, altered, or deteriorated original?
If so, how should one approach the process of copying?
Some comfort, perhaps can be gained from examining in detail the
oeuvres of certain great instrument makers of the past. Cecil Adkins
has found, for example, a high degree of uniformity among the bores of
Hendrik Richters's oboes[1]. I have found that the design of Ruckers-
family muselar virginals, after a period of experimentation evident
in Hans Ruckers's instruments of 1581 and 1591, remained highly stable
in the work of his sons Ioannes and Andreas and of their nephew Ioannes
Couchet. Henri Hemsch's earliest extant harpsichord, now at the Museum
of Fine Arts in Boston, is virtually identical in design to one made by
his master Antoine Vater. Hemsch's several later harpsichords were also
made according to a standard design. One could hardly maintain that
Richters, the Ruckers, and Hemsch copied their masters' instruments or
made series of demonstrably similar instruments with the intention of
endowing each individual instrument with its own special character.
That is, one may assume that these makers strove for a uniform quality
from instrument to instrument and that the means of attaining this
uniformity was to make instruments that were, insofar as practicable,
of identical design. It follows that we today, by studying and
following their designs and materials, should be able to reproduce
their results. That is, if, down to the submicroscopic level, our copy
is identical to the original, allowing for a reversal of chemical and
physical changes that might have occurred within the original, then the
copy should sound and function precisely as the original did when it
was new. Obviously this ideal is unattainable, but it can, I believe,
be approached. The principal means is, of course, the increasingly
detailed study of antique instruments, most of which are in museums.
Thus, those of us in the museum professions are closely involved, in
one way or another, in the making of copies.
Accurate identification or analysis of materials and precise
measurement of dimension are the chief necessities. Some other aspects
are not so obvious. Many harpsichord copyists, for example, seem not to
realize that it is necessary to saw a bridge to its curve if the
original maker did so, rather than bending it to shape. At a more
subtle level, it is possible, or even probable that some makers
adjusted soundboard thicknesses according to the elasticity or
resonance of its particular piece of wood. Thus, the soundboard of a
true acoustical copy, made from a different piece of wood, might well
be slightly different in thicknessing from the original. In other
instances, it might not be clear whether certain components of the
original instrument were sprung into place with consequent internal
tensions or pressures. Soundboards now flat might originally have been
slightly arched or crowned. Reasonable answers to such problems might
well emerge, however, from more careful examination and precise
dimensional and acoustical measurement of larger numbers of historical
instruments. One consequence of such considerations is that we should
not assume that an instrument has yielded all its secrets merely
because a seemingly complete and accurate technical drawing has been
made.
In recent years some makers have retreated from asserting that they
make copies of specific historical instruments. Rather, they claim to
have risen to the higher plane of having so fully absorbed a mode of
working that they can independently work `in the style of' some
historical maker or period. One piano maker is even rumoured to have
believed that he was the reincarnation of Stein. One wonders how he
reacted when it was discovered that the `Stein' piano which was his
chief inspiration had actually been made by Louis Dulcken. Letting
aside such apparent cases of lunacy, we should recognize that there is
a danger in the view that is sometimes expressed in the form `one
copies what one does not understand,' that is, that the goal should be
to understand a style and then work freely within it, synthesizing the
result from one's self. Needless to say, there is a great danger of
hubris in such a belief. One might even observe the reverse, that many
makers do not understand what they do not copy; that there is a
reason for everything that an old maker did and that modern copyists
change things at their peril.
The Antoine Vaudry harpsichord of 1681 at the Victoria & Albert Museum
in London has a bizarre but unquestionably genuine soundboard-ribbing
scheme[2]. I followed this as faithfully as I could in a copy that I
made some years ago. The tone of this copy, even with very weak
quilling, was found, by direct comparison, to have considerably more
carrying power than that of a similarly accurate copy of the 1728
Christian Zell harpsichord, which has a more conventional soundboard
design. I have met several harpsichord makers who, in making so-called
copies of the Vaudry, did not dare to assume that Vaudry knew what he
was doing. They therefore altered the ribbing to a more normal pattern.
All extant seventeenth-century French harpsichords, despite constants
of disposition and action design, are radically different from each
other in case construction, scaling, ribbing, and materials. Some
modern makers have taken this as a license to regard the early French
style as a sort of menu from which one can make an idealized
harpsichord by taking the scaling of one antique, the case construction
of another, and the ribbing from a third in order to synthesize their
own designs within the perceived confines of that eclectic style.
Against this practice I would argue that each early French maker
created his design from first principles, with a careful balance of
individual elements of design. Thus, for example, the long scaling of
an instrument like the Vaudry might require a rather heavily ribbed
soundboard, while in a short-scaled instrument like one of 1667 at the
Boston Museum of Fine Arts the soundboard would be lightly ribbed.
Marin Mersenne hints at this sort of approach when he writes that the
case walls should be thinner when a harder wood is used[3]. Thus, to
make a composite harpsichord based on several instruments would be to
misunderstand completely the intentions of the seventeenth-century
French makers.
It should be evident to any careful reader of instrument makers'
brochures and advertisements or to any alert visitor to early music
trade shows that most modern instruments of historical type, even those
claimed to be modelled after specific antique instruments, fall far
short of even rather lax standards of objective historical accuracy. In
a recent issue of Early Music, for example, one sees an advertisement
for a `Harpsichord after Carl Conrad Fleischer 1720 (Museo de Musica,
Barcelona).' A two-manual instrument with compass GG to f''' is shown.
The original harpsichord in Barcelona has, however, a single manual
with a compass ending at c'''[4]. As objective evidence of how the
Fleischer harpsichord might originally have sounded and functioned, the
advertised instrument must be regarded as meaningless, and the museum's
efforts in providing the maker with access to the original or with
information about it might well be regarded as a waste of time.
A couple of years ago our Museum received a letter from a distinguished
performer who wanted some information about one of our Haas trumpets.
He wanted us to measure precisely the pitches of the natural series of
tones and their deviations from the overtone series. He needed this
data, he said, so that, starting with dimensional measurements that he
had obtained previously from the instrument before it entered our
collections, his workman could alter these dimensions in a copy so that
the pitches of the copy would be more in tune than those of the
original. I politely declined, making the quite truthful excuse that
the variability introduced by the choice of mouthpiece and the lack of
an experienced performer would render the validity of any pitch
measurements questionable and that, therefore, we should not subject
the instrument to the potential damage or wear that might be caused by
playing it and subsequently cleaning it.
What we have is an example of Gresham's law, that the bad money drives
out the good. If a performer can make an international career by
playing altered copies falsely advertised as original instruments, what
incentive is there for other performers to learn how satisfactorily to
play accurate copies of baroque trumpets? If a manufacturer can sell
pianos `inspired by the instruments of Andreas Stein' which so little
reflect the round-tailed originals that they have angled tails, what
incentive is there for a maker to produce more accurate copies? If
plastic harpsichord jacks and synthetic resin glues will suffice for a
so-called `Ruckers copy,' why bother making reproduction beechwood
jacks with bristle springs and blind damper holes; why bother using
hide glue? It is time-consuming and therefore expensive for a maker
to seek out and measure appropriate antique instruments and to make new
plans, jigs, or reamers and to obtain appropriate materials for each
different historical copy. Few makers bother.
To be sure, inaccurate copies have been around for a long time. The
pianos made in the 1790s by the Graebner brothers of Dresden can be
regarded basically as copies of J.A. Stein's instruments (though, to be
sure, they would probably not originally have been sold as such). The
Graebners, however, failed to extend the straight part of the inner
bent side as a brace to the belly rail, Stein's usual construction. But
the Graebner brothers did not have radiographs or flashlights; they
might not even have had access to a real Stein piano.
Makers today do not have these excuses, but, even so, the economic
pressures are such that those who are conscientious need all the help
that we, as museum professionals, can give them. It is appropriate for
museums, as institutions of education, research, and cultural
preservation, to promote the making of copies. From my former existence
as a professional harpsichord maker, I can say that museums throughout
Europe and North America are, in general, doing a good job in allow
access to instruments, publishing reasonably priced technical drawings,
and providing other forms of information.
It is also appropriate for museums to be more directly involved in
making copies. As alternatives to restoration and to the frequent use
of restored antiques for routine practice and performance, copies are
increasingly being made within museums themselves or are commissioned
from reputable makers. At our Museum, for example, we have commissioned
a copy of our 1785 Jacques Germain harpsichord, and we already have
acquired a violin after our 1693 long-pattern Strad. Who can say that
the violin copy, in which the original baroque state has been
reconstructed, is not closer to the sound of the original when it was
new than a patched, regraduated, retrofitted old fiddle?
Two questions of museum ethics should briefly be mentioned for further
consideration. First, should museums seek to acquire copies of objects
not in their own collections? Many of the great collectors of the
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries filled gaps in their holdings
with copies. Sometimes, despite otherwise careful record keeping, the
copies, now themselves antiques, are no longer recognized for what they
are. A case in point is a crumhorn in the Galpin collection, which was
acquired by the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 1917. Among historical
crumhorns it is exceptional, being covered with leather and its curve
having been formed by the cutting-out of wedges. A radiograph and
description are included in a standard book about crumhorns[5]. Yet,
the instrument is another of Galpin's copies or reconstructions. In a
typescript checklist of his collection from 1911 that I recently came
across, Galpin listed this item as `Cromorne ..., as used c. 1600.
Italy.' This wording `as used' was Galpin's code for describing a newly
made instrument. By the time of Nicholas Bessaraboff's catalogue of the
Boston museum's instruments, the modern origin of this crumhorn had
been forgotten[6]. Thus, however innocent and however legitimate in
intent was Galpin's addition of this instrument to his collection, not
only has the public been misled by its exhibition, in the context of a
museum, next to genuine antique instruments but also, eventually,
scholars have been misled.
A second question that might be considered is whether museums should
actively seek to prevent misleading marketing of instruments claimed to
have been modelled after objects in their collections. The educational
mission of an institution owning a single-manual four-octave
harpsichord is ill served if a two-manual five-octave instrument is
advertised and sold with the name of the original maker and the
location of the original instrument prominently displayed. Perhaps
makers, as a condition of being given access to instruments or of
purchasing technical drawings, could be required to sign a pledge not
to cite the original instrument or the museum that owns it if their
copies do not meet a minimal standard of accuracy.
With other kinds of objects museums sometimes engage in exclusive
licensing agreements. According to former director Thomas Hoving, the
Metropolitan Museum in New York, as a marketing agency, has perpetual
exclusive rights to make and sell reproductions of King Tut's
jewellery, the originals of which are in the Cairo museum[7]. It would
be most unfortunate if this concept of exclusivity were extended to
musical instruments. The firm that in the 1930s restored Mozart's
Walter piano in the Salzburg Geburtshaus seems to have had exclusive
rights to produce copies of it. Other makers have been refused access
to the original instrument, while the so-called Meisterkopien seem to
have been more or less run-of-the-mill productions, with keyboards, for
example, patently different in detail from Walter's and Mozart's
keyboard. The difficulties of the first stages of the modern early
piano revival were significantly compounded by this shameful situation.
Mozart's music belongs to the world, no matter who happens to own the
autograph score. The same should be true of the design of his piano and
of all musical instruments by the masters of the past.
NOTES
One of the main practical difficulties in preparing technical drawings
in a traditional way is in taking precise measurements. Factors such as
the lack of fixed points of reference to measure from, errors in
transferring measurements, distortions resulting from the thickness of
the drawing instrument, changes in paper size and size change when
copying are well known. When a drawing is prepared, measurements are
taken from an object which itself has probably changed in size and has
distorted, for instance through wood drying out. Some of these changes
in size and shape, however, are inadvertently rectified on the drawing
paper: a bent flute becomes straight again, the bottom-board of
harpsichord buckled by strain from the strings is drawn as if it were
still flat, etc. The result is a drawing which is made even more
distorted through inconsistent rectifications of its present state as
well as errors in measuring, and which cannot serve as a true mirror
either of the present or the original size and shape of the instrument.
When making a drawing, it may be possible (or even necessary) to obtain
more precise measurements. To illustrate some lessons to be learnt we
will take as examples a clavichord, a harpsichord and a dulcimer.
The Clavichord
Our museum holds a travelling clavichord which Leopold Mozart purchased
for his son in 1763 from the master of Augsburg, Johann Andreas Stein.
This instrument was shown in the exhibition organised by the
Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, on the occasion of the recent Mozart
anniversary. The catalogue of the exhibition contained an essay on the
instrument. The thorough studies which preceded the exhibition dealt
not only with its history, but with its size and comparisons of size.
Analysis showed that the builder used the Werkschuh, the unit of
length used in Augsburg (the measure used in all Stein's instruments).
Using this old unit, therefore, one gets a more precise idea of the
proportions of the instrument. Knowing these proportions, we can have a
clearer view of the instrument's original size. Recalculating the sizes
based on the old non-decimal system may also give a clue to the
builder's ideas of scaling. As it was intended to be a travelling
instrument, its compact size was achieved through shortening the
scaling considerably, starting from the centre. The degree and
structure of this shortening can be readily understood if the sizes are
given in the old system of units. The spacing of the strings on the
bridge is, in fact, the basic unit in this old system.
The Harpsichord
The instrument dates back to 1571 and has been altered several times.
It is in an incomplete state even today. The instrument suggested
several questions to which we tried to find answers through a series of
investigations. We used various techniques to analyze what survived
from the paint and strings, prepared radiographs and also had a
technical drawing prepared by a professional. We found, however, that
no matter how attractive the drawing appeared, it was not fit for use.
Its shortcomings must have been due to the accumulation of the factors
mentioned above. I was supposed to provide suitable data for the
draughtsman: however, I lacked anything beyond information of a general
nature. The only lesson we learned was that good intentions and
endeavour are not enough. We had no choice but to start again. In
measuring the instrument as precisely as possible this time, we did not
restrict ourselves to physical measurement; instead we attempted to
ascertain the sizes and proportions unique to this instrument and to
explore the principles underlying its structure. This series of
measurements took a very long time, but it did produce the desired
results. We found the proportions peculiar to the instrument, from
which we could guess the original unit of length. We also found some
marks left by compasses, from which we managed to reconstruct the
principles of its construction and to infer the size the builder
intended and the extent to which the wood had shrunk; the deviations
arising from the process of construction and from defects in the
builder's work.
The Dulcimer
A trainee restorer prepared a technical drawing of an 18th-century
dulcimer last summer in connection with a restoration. Lessons learnt
from experience warned us to start by exploring the measurements. Our
search was all the more conscientious because the rose and the frame
usually contain basic sizes. The most important result of the
measurement analysis was that we were able to ascertain the
instrument's country of origin, Switzerland. The first important piece
of information for this was the unit of length, which we managed to
discover and identify. Knowing the country whose instruments we had to
study more thoroughly, we were soon able to do determine some country-
specific aspects such as the shape of the wrest-plank, the design of
the tuning-pins, the rose and the bridge. The drawing was prepared with
great care. However, control measurements suggested that
notwithstanding this, it contained an error. The trainee restorer had
used, following instructions at the academy, the modern unit of length
(centimetre) rulers, compasses and plummet. Her error was probably
unavoidable since these instruments allow a millimetre precision at
best. Added to this were the factor discussed above such as inadvertent
rectification of changes in size due to shrinkage of wood, etc.
All the above suggests the following conclusions: only imperfect
drawings can be prepared with the instruments and the usual methods of
drawing available at present, and the extent of the imprecision and the
usefulness of the resultant drawings are far from unimportant. As most
of the technical drawings serve as the basis for the preparation of
`replicas', a serious defect of most currently available drawings is
the lack of information on tolerances as well as the points, lines and
surfaces from which measurements start, although the maker of a replica
should use the very same points.
Such imperfect measurements result in drawings having faults in quite
unpredictable places, and even when we notice that the drawing is
wrong, we find it hard to say why! Consequently, it is equally
difficult to list the most frequent types of error and to draw lessons
from them. It would be highly advisable, therefore, (and I consider
CIMCIM to be the appropriate forum) to work out recommendations for the
starting points for measurements for technical drawings of each
instrument type as well as the principles and order in which a drawing
should be prepared. If the measurements are analyzed simultaneously
with the preparation of a technical drawing, it becomes easier to
understand the principles on which the instrument was originally made,
to reconstruct the original sizes, and to explore the intentions of the
maker and any mistakes he made in his measurements or in the course of
construction. Similarly it appears to be useful for the original unit
of length to be given where known.
Although I am aware of the fact that many curators of collections with
musical instruments cannot currently rely on services with a
radiographic equipment, I would like to talk about radiography as a
useful modern technique for organological research. An radiograph is a
very concrete source of information for a better understanding of the
musical instrument. It reveals the internal structure of the
instrument, as well as previous alterations, repairs, the density of
materials, woodworm damage, etc.
Although Wilhelm Röntgen scanned the human body soon after his
discovery of X-rays in 1895, their application in the field of
organology is quite recent. To my knowledge, the first printed evidence
of radiographing instruments dates from 1949. The Galpin Society
Journal of that year published an article from Eric Halfpenny `The
English 2- and 3-Keyed Hautboy' in which he shows a radiograph section
of an oboe[1]. In the next twenty years, many of his articles included
radiographs of wind instruments.
This fact shows one of the main problems of the technique. Because many
wind instruments have quite small three-dimensional dimensions, they
lend themselves well to radiography in the traditional way: this means
radiography at a short focus to film distance and on films of small
sizes. The short distance between the source and the object, put
against the film, gives a considerable distortion because of parallax,
especially in three-dimensional objects; several parts of these objects
cannot be in contact with the film. The narrow diameter of oboes and
other small wind instruments has the advantage that no part of the
instrument lies far from the film, which gives a quite reliable
picture. In the case of jointed instruments, the length can be reduced
to fit the size of the film, by putting several parts separately. The
example, given by Halfpenny, shows the bell, upper and lower joints of
the oboe in that way.
In spite of the limitations, the information given by those X-ray films
is very useful. Thicknesses of the sides, the course of the bore, the
shape and undercutting of the finger-holes are clearly shown. A
complete picture of a bigger instrument, radiographed in this
conventional way, can only be obtained by exposing successively
different small sheets of film. The multiplicity of required films and
the differences of parallax between them, makes the total view of the
instrument hardly legible.
The method encountered a great deal of criticism in the fifties,
especially regarding other types of instruments, such as stringed
instruments. At the International Lute Colloquium, organised by the
Centre de la Recherche Scientifique in Neuilly (France) in 1957,
Michael Prynne insisted upon the importance of having a good knowledge
about the internal structure of musical instruments. In the following
discussion he stated that radiography was a `technique to which one
hardly has access and with little value as a research method for the
knowledge of structural details'[2]. Consequently, it was only used
sporadically in the field of organology.
It is greatly to the credit of Friedemann Hellwig (former conservator
at the Germanisches Nationalmuseum in Nuremberg) to have started
systematically radiographing all types of instruments in the seventies.
He also experimented with radiography at a greater distance and on
large sheets of paper, for instance with harpsichords[3].
About the same period, the Brussels Museum of Musical Instruments could
rely on the services of the Royal Art Patrimony Institute, and started
with some radiography programmes. Already in the early seventies, a
large-format film was used at the Institute for large paintings and
sculptures[4]. Because large-size X-ray films are not available, one
had to turn to a graphic film, obtainable in rolls of maximum width 1.2
metres. From 1973 on, tests on this type of film were made with musical
instruments[5].
The advantages of this type of film are:-
Many instruments of all types, belonging to the Brussels Museum of
Musical Instruments, have been radiographed on large-format films. Some
examples show the value of this method:-
5-course guitar by Cassas, Barcelona, ca 1800 (inv. no. 3184)
Two different views of the guitar have been put together on the
photograph: at the left, the one taken in linear projection and the
other one in an angle of 78.. The internal structure, revealed by the
radiographs, confirms traditional Spanish guitar-making rules. The
upper block forms one whole with the heel of the neck, the back being
thicker at this point (see the white patch at the top of the back). The
sides of the instrument fit into two grooves. Two thin transverse bars
at the inside of the belly fit in triangular wooden strips, glued to
the ribs. At the bottom, the reinforcement of the ribs, is rather thin.
Different materials, used for decoration, appear in various densities.
Structural details show up more clearly in the right picture because of
the three-dimensional effect. The straight one is more appropriate for
measuring constructional details.
Harpsichord by Vincent Tibaut, Toulouse 1679 (inv. no. 553). This is a
reduction of a full-size radiograph of the instrument without keyboard
and jacks. The distance between focus and film was 4 metres, which
required an exposure of 25 minutes. The radiograph of this instrument
was been taken because this harpsichord is almost hermetically closed
by a wooden board of more than 3 cm thick, glued to the original
bottom. Earlier restoration has been carried out improperly. The
radiograph shows that six rectangular pieces were cut out of the
original bottom, most probably in order to put a new barring on the
belly. In general, the materials used and their density provide clues
which enable the picture to be interpreted. The triangular lateral
supports and the two bars across the bottom are all attached by means
of nails. They seem to be original.
Lutes by Johann Christian Hoffmann, Leipzig, 1716 and 1730 (inv. no.
1559 and 3188)
Both these instruments have been radiographed in order to compare the
barring inside the belly. The barring of the earliest lute appears to
be original, whereas the one on the new belly of the 1730 instrument
has no historical basis. The curved bass-bar and the thin fan-bars
below the bridge have been replaced by one straight bar on the latter
instrument. In other aspects, historical building has been confirmed:
in both instruments, the joints between neck/body and neck/pegbox have
been secured by iron nails.
From other interesting historical lutes, only the bodies with the
attachment to the neck have been radiographed at a distance of 3
metres, in order to reduce the effects of parallax as much as possible.
They proved to be a reliable basis for measuring the positions and the
thicknesses of the bars. To check this reliability, a radiograph from
the belly of an open instrument was taken in the same circumstances.
Measurements taken from a radiograph of a theorbo by Pietro Railich
(inv. no. 1569) and from the belly itself were almost identical.
Cornetti of the Brussels Museum have been radiographed in small groups,
in order to compare structural features[6]. Most of them are said to be
Italian [ill. 3, inv. no. 1208]. The bore, thickness of the sides,
disposition of the finger-holes with little undercutting, several
bindings under the leather to hold two pieces of wood together, are
quite the same. One small `cornettino' could be of German origin (inv.
n. 1187). The radiograph shows only one binding at the bottom, a metal
reinforcement on top between wood and leather, finger-holes spaced in
groups of three with oblique undercutting of the middle ones.
Conclusion
A full-size radiograph is a useful source of information for the knowl-
edge of constructional details on historic musical instruments. As
such, the technique is a valuable contribution for the making of
reliable copies. Yet, one has to be careful in the interpretation of
these pictures: distortions due to parallax must be calculated and the
fact that not all materials - such as thin glue-marks - clearly show up
on the film can lead to misunderstanding some aspects.
NOTES
Why do we do it? Why do we go to the trouble of providing plans?
There are, of course, a number of reasons. The most basic, and one that
we would probably only admit to among ourselves as a prime reason, is
to make money. How the rest of you are placed, I don't know, but until
we got our Friends organised, and through them a capital fund which
provides a little interest each year, we had no purchase fund, and we
still have nothing from the University for this purpose. And yet we
have bought a lot of instruments in the eleven years that I have been
Curator, most recently the only Hieronymus Albrecht Hass clavichord in
Britain - very frustrating, we have had it for more years than anyone
can remember as a loan, and then every curator's nightmare, the lender
who needed money - so we had to raise a great deal of money, .30,000,
just to keep what we already had. And this is the main way that we do
raise money, by our sales. We sell guides, catalogues, postcards, and
so on and so forth, and plans of our instruments.
We are very fortunate. Our own publications are written on my computer
and printed on the Faculty's photocopier. Thus they are very easy to
produce, and I would encourage other curators of small collections like
ours, 1500-2000 instruments, to produce Check Lists and small sectional
catalogues like these which are extremely valuable as references, to
know what is in a collection. A result of this mode of production is
that the profit margin is high! Most of our plans are published the
same way because all woodwind smaller than bassoons will fit an A3
sheet; we don't make as much profit off bassoons because we have to pay
to get the plans printed in the local architects' copy shop. But we
have been very lucky with plans, too. Initially we inherited two plans
from Edgar Hunt when we bought his recorder collection, both of the
famous Bressan treble recorder, one drawn by Fred Morgan and the other
by Friedrich von Huene. Both of these gentlemen permitted us to sell
copies of these drawings. Then Ken Williams got a grant from the
Australia Council to come to England to draw plans of as many of our
instruments as he could during a summer, to provide a resource for
Australian instrument makers. Ken was a member of FoMRHI, the
Fellowship of Makers and Researchers of Historical Instruments, and it
was in that context that he had got the idea of doing this. We, of
course, supported very strongly his application to the Australia
Council because I knew that we would benefit too. Several other people
have drawn plans because they wanted the information and they were kind
enough to draw a saleable plan for us in return for being allowed to
measure it. Others have done so in return for hospitality while they
have been in Oxford, and for payment of their fares to travel to us. So
we have built up a big list, second only to the Gemeente Museum in The
Hague, as you will know if you have looked at that very useful list by
Rob van Acht (published by Moeck), and we are increasing it all the
time.
I glanced just now at another reason for providing plans: as a resource
for makers. This, leaving aside the need for money which affects us all
when we see just the instrument we want appearing in the sale room,
this is the real and by far the most important reason for providing
plans. As we all know, there are not enough original early instruments
around for everyone who wants to play them, and anyway nobody in the
eighteenth century was playing on instruments two hundred and fifty
years old. The only way to have enough early instruments, and the only
way to have ones that are not two hundred and fifty years old, is for
modern makers to produce reproductions. And for that, they need plans.
Or at least they need to have measurements of the instruments. Which
brings us to a third reason for providing plans. Every time an
instrument is measured, it risks being damaged. Quite apart from the
risk of being dropped when it is handled, contact with measuring tools
is inevitably a risk. If we provide plans we can forbid any further
measuring of those instruments for which we have plans, unless and
until the person who wants to measure it can prove that the existing
measurements are inadequate in some respect.
I mentioned contact with measuring tools. One of our bugbears has been
the use of metal measuring tools, and it is one that we need to look at
again. I would agree that we must ban hardened steel caliper gauges -
they are dangerous in even the most careful hands. But T-gauges are
another matter. A T-gauge with very smooth and properly rounded ends
such as the Mitutoyo is a great deal safer than some plastic discs I
have seen. I have had people come into the Bate, quite reputable
makers, too, with plastic discs with edges just as sharp as their
reamers. Obviously, they want a nice clean cut-off point for the
measurement. But if I were to let them use those discs on our
instruments, we would soon have instruments with stepped bores. They
were surprised that I banned the use of their plastic, at least until
they had rounded off all the edges, and more surprised that I permitted
a steel T-gauge, but gentle use of rounded, smooth steel is infinitely
safer for the instrument than the use of sharp-edged, rough plastic.
Ideally we need a non-contact system, but I have not found one yet that
works and is affordable. Radiography is no use because of parallax
problems, although of course they are always useful for additional
information. The best I have met yet are machines like Rod Cameron's
and a rather better German version that reads out digitally or into a
computer instead of on a chart recorder like Cameron's; it didn't need
as much setting up, calibrating, and checking as Rod's, either. These
are still invasive contact machines, but the contact is very light and
the result is a complete picture of the bore rather than a series of
steps, which is what you get with T-gauges or discs. As so often, it
comes back to money. There are better methods used in industry, but
while they can afford a few thousands or tens of thousands of pounds to
make sure that their aeroplane engines or atomic energy components are
the size they want, we can't. We cannot even afford to buy one of Rod's
machines, or one of the German ones, and then pay somebody to measure
all our instruments so they never have to be touched again. And
certainly I have not got the time to do it. Nor could one insist that
all visiting makers could use only such a machine even if we were to
provide it, for some would not have the skill. Though if we could
afford to buy one, it would be a very strong temptation to insist on
just that; if this is the safest method I know, would it not be right
to make that the only permitted one? Especially as it is also the
most accurate method that I know when it is properly handled.
This brings me to the next problem. Are our measurements accurate, our
plans adequate? Fundamentally, no. No maker really trusts anybody's
measurements except his own. Here one just has to be tough and say,
`what we have is good enough and anyway it is all you are going to
get'.
Is any plan adequate? And here again the answer is no. It lacks one
essential element. It is silent. A good plan should, of course, have a
table of pitches. Some of ours have, and some, because the measurer was
not an oboist or whatever, don't. Anyway, I don't really believe that
it is possible to produce definitive pitches on any instrument that
requires a reed. Two players with two reeds will produce radically
different results. Our oldest oboe, the anonymous so-called Galpin, was
noted by one payer as playing at A=407 Hz. Bruce Haynes was sure it was
A=392. Both were right - with their reeds and their playing techniques.
Even two players with the same reed will get different results.
Pitch is not the main problem, though; it is the tone that counts. If
the copy doesn't sound like the original, it is not a copy. John Koster
pointed out that sound changes over the centuries. Nevertheless, the
sound of the original instruments today is the only evidence that we
have of what they did sound like. Either we take that as evidence or we
proceed by guess-work. How do you find out whether the copy does sound
like the original? I will allow makers to play the instrument,
especially if they bring an example of their own reproduction. If the
reproduction is at the same pitch as the original, and if it is made
accurately, I will allow them to mix the joints, our top, their middle,
and so on. We have learned quite a lot that way, among other things
that no plan is adequate. It will get you so far, but unless you are
Bressan, you are never going to produce a Bressan recorder. It is like
a map in that respect. It will teach you how to get from A to B, but it
will not tell you that Antwerp is a beautiful city; it will not tell
you what the streets smell like, how the stones feel under the foot, or
what it feels like to be here. Nor will the new technology of computer
virtual reality tell you these things either. You have to be here. And
you have to play the instrument. If you cannot, one dimension is
missing from the information, and this, depending on the local rules,
may mean that all the plans from certain museums may be missing that
dimension. A recording, however good, is not the answer, either; that
is like the computer virtual reality; it is virtual, but it is not
real.
We still have other problems. We cannot yet provide plans of our early
cors anglais; we have not been able to think of a way to get accurate
measurements round the curves. We cannot provide plans of any of our
brass. Partly again the problem of accurate measurements round the
curves, but with most of them the sheer problem of getting a tool of
any sort through the bore. Anyone can measure the outside, of course,
but that doesn't tell you what the inside is like, and it is the air on
the inside that makes the noise. My ears tell me that this is the
problem with most of the modern reproduction brass instruments on the
market today; they don't sound much like the originals, and while some
of it is due to bad playing practice and the use of modern mouthpieces,
a good deal of it is due to the instruments themselves, which quite
simply are not accurate copies, and they are not accurate copies
because nobody is providing accurate information about the bores of
original brass.
What I said just now brings me to my final point. And it takes us back
to where we started. Why do we do it? Why do we go to the trouble of
providing plans if makers are going to fake their instruments with
plastic bores, with extra holes, with modern conveniences, and if
players are going to stick modern mouthpieces in them and play them
with modern playing techniques. Put like that, there is not a lot of
point in the whole process, is there? I suppose from the museum
point of view it is part of the documentation of the instrument. From
the didactic point of view, and most of us believe in educating the
public rather than just entertaining them, like the many Disneylands we
all have around us, we are providing information about the instrument
and teaching people more about it. And from the early music point of
view, there are a few players in all areas who do care about original
sonorities, who care passionately about making the right sounds, who do
not want to fake their instruments or their playing techniques.
Ultimately we provide our plans for them and for the makers whom they
inspire and who inspire them. Maybe, with the information we provide,
new and better craftsmen will appear, and one day again there will be a
Bressan, a Ruckers, a Stradivarius. And once again we shall hear the
real sound of music.
Musical instruments and accessories often incorporate materials from
species now threatened with radical depletion or extinction. Commonly
encountered examples of these materials, which may serve structural,
ornamental, or symbolic purposes, include tropical hardwoods such as
Brazilian rosewood (Dalbergia nigra), grenadilla (Platymiscium
pleiostachyum), and Caribbean mahogany (Swietenia mahagoni);
elephant ivory; sea turtle shell; and certain reptile and mammal skins
that provide drum and chordophone membranes. In addition, exotic
feathers, ungulate horns, marine shells, coral, whalebone (baleen) and
other substances from endangered wildlife occur particularly in ethnic
instruments, which are among the most attractive and desirable to
casual collectors such as tourists.
When museums display such instruments or promote their restoration and
`authentic' replication without commenting on species depletion, what
attitude is conveyed to our public? Do we unwittingly contribute, if
only in a small way, to the decimation of vulnerable fauna and flora?
Are adequate substitute materials available, or can they be developed?
Museum professionals ought at least to discuss these issues. Opting
out of controversy by claiming concern solely for art or technology or
history isolates us from broader social concerns and fosters a sense
that museums are irrelevant, even irresponsible.
Many instrument makers and restorers now refuse on principle to use raw
materials from endangered species. I propose that CIMCIM should join
with these concerned craftsmen and with other ICOM colleagues to
condemn and, by our example, restrain ungoverned exploitation of
disappearing fauna and flora. Furthermore, we should deplore waste of
existing stocks, because a case can be made for using up these supplies
in a thoughtful manner. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service warehouses
confiscated material at certain airports and dispenses it on permanent
loan to nonprofit institutions such as museums, where it may be used in
restoration provided a log is kept of this usage. The widely publicized
but, I believe, misguided burning of 2500 confiscated elephant tusks
worth US$3 million, ordered in 1989 by Daniel arap Moi, president of
Kenya, benefitted no one and has led to further losses: on June 4,
1993, a pile of tusks was publicly burned in Taiwan. Had those tusks
been given ceremoniously to nonprofit scientific and cultural
institutions for their controlled use, the same political purpose would
have been served. ICOM should endeavour to educate authorities
concerning a more sensible and sympathetic disposition of confiscated
materials.
Useful amounts of ivory, tropical hardwoods, baleen, and so forth
disappear less dramatically when unwanted pianos, furniture, old
whalebone-stayed corsets, etc., are thoughtlessly discarded, or when
captive animals die or trees fall in storms. CIMCIM should encourage
legitimate extraction and recycling of their valuable components
especially when, in exceptional cases, no adequate substitute may be
available - for example, to match a missing piece of rare veneer.
The important point is that lucrative trade in imperiled species must
be discouraged. Although efficient wildlife and habitat management
occasionally requires culling burgeoning populations, so long as a
profitable market exists unregulated killing and smuggling will
continue. I believe that the right of species to survive outweighs any
consideration of aesthetics and `authenticity' of objects or of
monetary gain, and that museums should lead in conserving the species
and habitats that form mankind's common heritage.
About 115 UN member nations signatory to the Convention on
International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora
(CITES) prohibit or restrict international movement of materials from
endangered species. An appalling, 22-page-long inventory of these
species is available in the U.S.A. from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife
Service of the Department of the Interior, and from corresponding
agencies in other countries. All museum libraries should possess copies
of this document, and curators should urge instrument makers and
restorers to consult it before obtaining materials. Museums as well as
tourists, musicians, dealers, and private collectors are directly
affected by CITES rules, which govern such matters as acquisition and
lending for exhibition.
CITES classifies endangered species in three categories or appendices
according to degree of risk. Appendix I includes species immediately
threatened with extinction; Appendix II includes species likely to
become threatened if trade in them is not regulated; Appendix III
includes species regulated internally by any signatory nation needing
the co-operation of other nations to control trade. The rate of
attrition in Appendix I is alarming: The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
reclassified six North American animals as extinct in 1989.
Shipment of Appendix I species requires both import and export permits;
Appendix I material taken from the sea outside any national
jurisdiction requires an `Introduction from the Sea' permit. Import of
Appendix I material for commercial purposes is generally prohibited;
permits are granted only when import or export will not be detrimental
to survival of the species. Appendix II material does not require
import permits, but export or Introduction from the Sea permits or
re-export certificates are necessary. Export permits may be issued for
any purpose if not detrimental to the species' survival; re-export
certificates are required for export of material that was previously
imported, including raw material subsequently converted to manufactured
goods. Appendix III species require one of three types of documents: 1)
an export permit, issued for material originating in any country that
listed the species on Appendix III (the U.S.A. lists no species under
Appendix III); 2) a certificate of origin, issued by a country of
origin other than a listing country (that is, by a country in which the
species is not threatened); 3) a re-export certificate issued for
previously imported material.
The number of affected species and of signatory nations will grow;
Bulgaria, Mexico, Namibia and Uganda ratified CITES in 1991. However,
sporadic political pressure to ease restrictions may be expected, for
example from the five countries, Botswana, Malawi, South Africa, Zambia
and Zimbabwe, that despite their CITES ratification have refused to ban
trade in raw ivory. International protection of whales and other marine
life also remains contentious, partly due to inadequate animal
population statistics.
Less easy to understand than a ban on killing are restrictions on
transporting finished goods, even antiques, containing materials from
endangered species. CITES regulations may at first appear nonsensical
insofar as they inhibit (but do not necessarily prohibit) international
movement of musical instruments for cultural purposes. Nevertheless,
the underlying objective, to change attitudes and preserve disappearing
species, must be recognized as paramount. Museums can challenge or seek
to refine aspects of CITES regulations, but may not subvert their
purpose.
Current embargoes govern transit of whole specimens or recognizable
parts and derivatives (excluding products of some trees), both for
commercial and non-commercial purposes including museum acquisition and
exhibition. Objects incorporating any amount of these materials,
regardless of age, ownership and provenance, may be confiscated by
customs agents if proper permits have not been obtained. Furthermore,
traffic in an unthreatened or extinct species can be prohibited if
material from this species (for example, mammoth ivory) so closely
resembles material from an endangered one that enforcement personnel
cannot tell the difference. When material from the endangered species
might be sold or transported illegally under the guise of the
practically indistinguishable unthreatened one, both may be listed. In
view of this danger, Sotheby's cautions potential purchasers in these
terms:
Certificates of exemption may be granted for international shipment of
demonstrably old material, but the burden of proving age rests on the
applicant, who may be required to provide scientific documentation.
Recently made objects and recent repairwork utilizing old material are
not automatically exempted. Even if an object is allowed to leave one
country legally, it may not be admitted by another or readmitted to the
first country without a separate permit or certificate.
Penalties for evasion, including fines and seizure of illicit
shipments, can be severe and irremediable; at the least, exhibition
schedules and insurance coverage can be seriously disrupted by a
customs investigation. Much depends on the mood and rigor of individual
inspectors, who may be overzealous if provoked, though they often
overlook small, unostentatious bits of regulated material used for
example in violin bows. Though loopholes exist, it is best to offer
well-documented declarations and not to try to evade inspection, as
doing otherwise can raise suspicions and jeopardize future official co-
operation with one's institution and its customs broker. Museum
registrars should therefore thoroughly vet all international shipments
in advance for the presence of embargoed materials, taking special care
with exotic items that may incorporate feathers, insect parts, shells,
furs and so on. Shipping containers must be clearly labelled with their
contents, and at least 72 hours' prior notice to inspectors of a
shipment's arrival is recommended.
In addition to CITES, stringent domestic laws also regulate some
species. Crows, for example, although generally plentiful and sometimes
a nuisance, cannot be hunted legally in most parts of the United
States; consequently quill for harpsichord plectra is often in short
supply. Species regulated by the U.S.A. are listed in the Endangered
Species Act of 1973 and the Endangered Species Conservation Act of
1969; other relevant U.S. laws include the African Elephant
Conservation Act, Marine Mammal Protection Act, Migratory Bird Treaty
Act, Eagle Protection Act, and Lacey Act. Jurisdiction under these acts
is shared by the Fish & Wildlife Service and the National Marine
Fisheries Service. Domestic regulations can be complicated; for
example, within the U.S.A. some normally prohibited commerce may be
permitted under special circumstances, but according to section 17.52
of the applicable regulations, `The permit for activities involving
interstate commerce of plants must be obtained by the seller; in the
case of wildlife [meaning animals], the permit must be obtained by the
buyer.' Ignorance of confusing laws and regulations does not excuse
violators.
The concerns discussed above raise serious issues for CIMCIM. As museum
professionals, we are obliged to furnish accurate information about our
holdings, and most of us encourage faithful reproduction of important
instruments originally made with now-regulated materials. But museums
also function in a wider sense to preserve and foster respect for our
shared heritage and environment; therefore our activities with regard
to treatment of endangered species should be models of ethical conduct.
So, we seemingly face a conflict between the demands of `authenticity'
and the need to preserve disappearing organisms and whole biosystems.
Museums that encourage copying of instruments from their collections
commonly provide technical drawings and other information identifying
original materials. These descriptions may seem to imply that, in order
to be valid, replicas must be made of the same substances as the
originals. It is advisable, therefore, that technical drawings, data
sheets, etc., carry a notice warning makers of pertinent regulations,
and advising that substitutes be employed where necessary. Current laws
do not prohibit craftsmen from using material that has been legally
obtained, but because it is usually impossible to confirm that hunters
or harvesters acted legally, new raw material is best avoided.
Restoration and replication necessarily involve compromise. In regard
to materials, compromise can most readily be effected in decorative
elements, where visually equivalent substitutes (such as synthetic
ivory, mother-of-pearl, abalone, buffalo horn, and tortoise shell) are
already commonplace. Tactile, acoustical, and structural aspects
present greater problems, although very few circumstances demand a
regulated material to achieve a particular sound or property. Yamaha's
most recent formulation of casein-based Ivorite, for example, overcomes
most objections to synthetic keyboard plating. Tropical hardwoods do,
however, represent substances whose density and texture are hard to
replicate and may indeed affect sound and response, as in woodwinds.
Technical problems like these can be solved; after all, substitutes
exist for living human blood and skin.
Developing a synthetic substitute often leads to fuller analysis of the
traditional substance, and for that reason alone substitution may be
worth pursuing. Substitutes may prove superior in some respects, such
as durability. Many timpanists actually prefer the stability and
consistency of synthetic drum heads, and most guitarists prefer nylon
strings to gut.
We have no need here to restate the truism that the pure original state
of an old instrument cannot be recovered by any means, and may not even
be knowable. In any case, because no two pieces of wood are identical,
no one reasonably expects a violin repair or replica, for example, to
be literally indistinguishable from the original upon close scrutiny.
Conservators and curators, at least, would not wish otherwise, since we
are obliged to make such distinctions.
It is not the function of curators and conservators to remake the past,
but rather to preserve and interpret important aspects of it. To be
effective, interpretation - meaning education - must address the needs
of our visitors, especially young people, who must learn that not all
that went before can or should be done in like manner today. Just
because now-endangered species were once exploited for the sake of
luxury and commercial gain, we need not continue this harmful practice
today when conditions are different. This attitude implies no
disrespect for the past. Simply put, human behavior must adjust to
contemporary reality if we are to survive as a healthy community
inhabiting a world rich in genetic diversity.
Because the potential benefits of endangered species and habitats to
humankind are incalculable, we have no right to allow their extinction
merely to feed today's fashion and vanity. Counter-argument based on
alleged aesthetic superiority of `authentic' materials versus
substitutes is ultimately unconvincing because subjective.
Nevertheless, we would do well to define better the effective
properties of traditional materials as a first step towards developing
adequate substitutes. Precisely what qualities of various materials
underlie their putative superiority, or do makers use them only out of
habit? Can the ear distinguish among them or are their virtues
chiefly psychological, as in many ritual instruments?
I have argued that museums are not `ivory towers' that stand apart from
worldly concerns. As educational institutions we undertake a
responsibility not only to preserve artifacts but to develop and impart
knowledge about our shared environment, with a view toward enhancing
appreciation and respect. How best to do this is, in my view, a far
more important issue than whether a particular historic instrument is
replicated or restored with real ivory or with cast polyester resin.
The issue as it concerns endangered species rests not solely on ethics
and responsibility, but also on practicality. Synthetics are often
cheaper, more stable and more durable than the natural materials they
replace; these advantages need to be considered especially in
situations where historic instruments or replicas are used in
performance. But where it is felt that traditional, regulated materials
are necessary, perhaps an informal, nonprofit supply network could
function without promoting commercial depredation. A museum stocking
more ebony that it could ever use might trade or give some of that
supply to a less fortunate institution. The harpsichordist Thurston
Dart had a private arrangement with the London Zoo, which often enough
provided him with naturally shed feathers; connoisseurs will note,
however, that only certain feathers provide the best quills and then
only in seasons when these feathers are strongest. Pressure on wild
birds therefore remains relentless. In any sharing network, great care
must be taken not to encourage illegal trade inadvertently by too
widely advertising a need, because whenever profit provides a motive,
laws will be subverted.
Curators must further decide how best to display instruments
incorporating prohibited materials so as not to encourage or legitimize
their use. A descriptive label might include the remark that `making
flutes of elephant ivory is no longer condoned.' Curators can make
virtue of necessity by proclaiming that `missing ivory key covers have
been replaced by synthetic ivory,' and thus enlist public sympathy for
wildlife while at the same time honestly defining the limits of
authenticity.
My personal views and suggestions are intended to provoke discussion,
but are not definitive and do not necessarily express the position of
the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Information about synthetic ivory,
horn, tortoise shell, mother-of-pearl, etc., can be obtained from,
among others, GPS Agencies (Mr. Roy Stevens), Units 3 & 3a, Hambrook
Business Centre, Cheesman's Lane, Hambrook, Chichester, West Sussex,
PO18 8UE, England.
The late fifteenth-century clavicytherium in the Donaldson collection
(formerly in the Contarini & Correr collections in Venice) appears to
be the earliest surviving stringed keyboard instrument; the `copy',
commissioned in 1970 and completed in 1973, is probably one of the
first to be commissioned by a Museum. This paper will give a brief
description and history of the original, followed by a survey of the
building of the reconstruction, the publication of a detailed plan
after radiographing the original, the research and developments that
have followed and the conclusions that may be drawn.
Relatively little attention has been given to the earliest stages of
the development of the harpsichord and remarkably little in most
general surveys to this important and fascinating instrument. When I
first began to compile a catalogue of the collection in 1964, virtually
no documentation on the clavicytherium existed apart from the published
references (some rather inaccurate) in Hipkins and Gibb, James, Russell
and Hirt[1] and the brief notes written by Dr Karl Geiringer for the
College in 1940 (his entry read: `a beautiful instrument in a quite
hopeless state of preservation'). The collection, including the
clavicytherium, was poorly displayed and conserved; the most urgent
task was to fumigate the collection against woodworm and then to raise
sufficient funding to rehouse it. Thanks to the generosity of Trusts
and individuals a new air-conditioned museum was built and opened in
April 1970.
Meanwhile, a thorough investigation of the clavicytherium was being
carried out. It transpired that it was probably made in South Germany,
circa 1480: inscriptions and manuscript fragments inside the instrument
indicate a late fifteenth-century German-speaking builder who may have
worked in Ulm. The decoration, the short wide keys and small compass
(40 notes) also suggest this early date. Much of the Italianate
landscape in the recess is missing but the surviving rose, a miniature
Gothic window carved in wood with painted and gilded paper behind, is
exquisite and the recess and soundboard are surrounded with carved and
painted Gothic tracery. The paintings on the case are later and the
keys were lengthened, rather crudely, by the addition of new key tops
and fronts, possibly when the compass was altered. The action is simple
and efficient: the keys are joined by vertical `stickers' to the jacks
and they return by gravity. Preserved in the Contarini and Correr
collections near Venice from the late seventeenth century, the
clavicytherium was sent to London for the International Inventions
Exhibition in 1885, after which George Donaldson acquired it. Further
information on the instrument has been published[2] or will be included
in the catalogue of the keyboard instruments which we hope to publish.
Because of its significance and fragile worm-eaten state, restoration
of the clavicytherium was out of the question. After consultation with
conservationists, when differing solutions were proposed, I decided
that consolidation should not be attempted; we should instead build as
complete a record of the instrument as possible, to learn from it
whatever we could whilst protecting the original from handling which it
would not survive. So Derek Adlam was asked to construct a `copy'
(reconstruction would perhaps be a better word); he began measuring in
November 1970, further photography was undertaken during his visits and
the reconstruction (funded by a generous gift from Mr and Mrs Graham
Carritt) was completed at Finchcocks under his direction by the firm of
Adlam-Burnett. Delivered to the Museum in June 1973 on the day of its
inaugural concert, the copy was launched by Derek Adlam; in addition to
his eloquent playing of solo repertoire, he also accompanied John
Elwes, at that time a student at the College. It has since been played
in a number of broadcasts, Museum concerts and lecture recitals and is
demonstrated regularly in tours of the collection and classes.
Although there are factors of which we cannot be sure, the copy has
revealed a good deal about the physical and musical characteristics of
the original. For the extensive contemporary repertoire (for example
the Buxheim Organ Book), much of it song intabulations, the instrument
is wholly appropriate and effective; the wide octave span makes it
difficult to play later music with more counterpoint or chords. Derek
Adlam felt that there was no conclusive evidence that the
clavicytherium originally had dampers so the copy was built without
them. The resulting resonance is a little confusing for the player and
anyone standing within six feet of the instrument; beyond that distance
the sound is clear and combines well with lute and voice. The Museum's
copy was built before William Debenham had established the original
compass so it was decided best to copy the present compass of E - g".
Further copies have been built by Derek Adlam and, after the
publication of the drawing, by other makers too, some instruments
having the original compass and at least one having dampers. The
Museum's copy is tuned in a Pythagorean or meantone temperament
according to the pieces being played and Mark Lindley and Mimi Waitzman
have used it in Museum lectures discussing repertoire and
temperaments[3]. We do not know the original pitch or string materials
(the fragments on the original are mostly of yellow brass) but the copy
has nonetheless enabled players and listeners to come closer to this
early repertoire.
In 1975 the original was radiographed so that a more detailed drawing
by William Debenham could be prepared. John Barnes had previously
proposed that the original compass was F-a", but this depended on there
being a replacement balance rail and variable octave widths. The
radiographs showed that only two balance pins had been moved: William
Debenham then undertook a further prolonged study of the keys and
eventually concluded that the original compass must have been E
`Esharp' F G - g"[4]. Further information and corroboration of the date
of origin has been gained from examination of inscriptions in ultra-
violet light and from the National Gallery Scientific Department's
examination of samples of blue and red paint by optical microscopy and
spectrographic analysis with the laser microprobe (LMA). Several
attempts to obtain a tree-ring dating of the back of the instrument
have been made, so far without success.
There is constant pressure, especially in a conservatoire collection,
to make historic musical instruments playable. I believe that the
solution that we chose with the clavicytherium fulfils the aims, so
often incompatible, of both conservation and education and would be the
best course for many other instruments in the collection if space and
funding could be found. Copies of important instruments such as the
harpsichord by Trasuntino, 1531, and virginals by Celestini, 1593,
would be particularly valuable. There is another earlier `copy' in the
Museum - the clavichord after Hass by Dolmetsch, commissioned by the
Director, Sir George Grove, in 1894 so that RCM students could play and
hear a clavichord. Besides being part of the history of the revival of
early keyboard instruments, it is still invaluable since even now few
visitors have heard a clavichord except in recordings. Three other
`copies' in the collection appear to have been made in the nineteenth
century as fakes. Some years ago John Barnes made a copy of the
Museum's clavichord by Johann Bohak, formerly owned by Haydn, when
investigating the instrument for the Museum[5]. In this instance it was
felt that as some of the original sound-producing parts were missing a
Museum copy should not yet be commissioned, though John Barnes's
drawing has recently been published by the Museum; if another
clavichord by Bohak with original tangents and bridge that could be
copied were to be found, a more accurate Museum copy would then become
possible.
The exact `copy' is an ideal that cannot be fully realised: it is like
the perfect performance for which every musician strives. And every
copy of the same model by the same maker will vary and have its own
`life' and distinct character. Instrument museums should nonetheless
strive to attain this ideal whenever appropriate to protect original
material and to illuminate and inform.
NOTES
A J Hipkins, A Description and History of the Pianoforte and
of the older Keyboard Stringed Instruments [London and New York,
1896], p.73.
P James, Early Keyboard Instruments [London, 1930], plate
XXXIII.
F J Hirt, Meisterwerke des Klavierbaus [Olten, 1955], p.292.
J H Van Der Meer, `A Contribution to the History of the
Clavicytherium', Early Music, VI, 1978, p.255; VII, 1979, p.140.
Elizabeth Wells, `An Early Stringed Keyboard Instrument: The
Clavicytherium in the Royal College of Music, London', Early Music,
VI, 1978, pp.568-71.
William Debenham, `The Compass of the Royal College of Music
Clavicytherium', FoMRHI Bulletin and Communications, XI, April 1978,
pp.19-21.
Music was an integral part of the life of ancient people as portrayed
in the Bible. It was a part of worship services (II Chronicles 30: 21),
prophetic utterances (II Kings 3: 14-15), celebrations of the return of
triumphant warriors (I Samuel 18: 6) and the coronation of kings (II
Kings 9: 13). The first musician mentioned in the Bible was Jubal, the
`father of all those who play the lyre and the pipe' (Genesis 4: 21).
King David had about 4000 singers and musicians; he wrote 150 psalms -
poems to be sung or accompanied by string instruments (55 of them
addressed to the chief musician or trained leader). About Solomon it is
written in the Bible that `his songs were a thousand and five ' (I
Kings 4: 32). Numerous instruments are mentioned frequently in the
Bible with names translated as horn, pipe, lyre, sackbut, psaltery and
dulcimer (Daniel 3: 5). Isaiah mentions the harp, lute, timbrel and
flute (Isaiah 5: 12); brass cymbals are indicated (I Chronicles 15:
19), and the shofar (ritual horn) and trumpet Hosea 5: 8).
Yet, no description of these and other instruments is available, and
for many generations research into the Biblical instrumentarium was
chiefly of a linguistic nature. Only in the last three decades, thanks
to important archaeological discoveries and to enterprising musicians,
artists and craftsmen in Israel, have new horizons opened up for
research into ancient music. The primary idea governing the preparation
of the collection here described was the reconstruction of the Biblical
world of music by actually producing the broad range of musical
instruments mentioned in the Bible.
Actual instruments discovered so far are very few - mainly those made
of metal (cymbals, bells) or pottery (whistles, rattles) but not of
organic material (wood, hide, gut). However, various instruments are
depicted on reliefs, frescoes, paintings, mosaics, coins etc. These
have supplied scholars with clues to a material culture and an
iconographic basis for determining the shapes of the instruments; even
in certain cases the actual mode of playing them. Archaeological
evidence is therefore the corner of the collection. Figurines,
statuettes, pavement stones, bone carvings and moulded pottery
depicting musicians are testimony to the important role that music
played, both for ritual and secular purposes.
An effort was made to bring together the best-preserved archaeological
finds pertaining to music which existed in Israel, whether in museums
or in private collections. We were also aided by foreign museums which
kindly responded to our requests. The archaeological evidence is very
diverse, encompassing a wide range of manifestations of material
culture and indicates remarkable artistic creativity. When
reconstructing the instruments, many complex problems confronted the
large team of experts - musicians, artists and craftsmen. There had to
be a thorough examination of the source material, determination of the
materials to be used, unravelling the mysteries of the structure,
dimensions, tuning, and a host of other matters. After all, the shape
of a kinnor (lyre) or a nevel (harp) on a coin or a vase does not
reveal to us the material of which it is made, which could be wood of
some kind, hide or gourd, what kind of strings, or the devices for
fixing and tensioning the strings. The known is far out-weighed by the
unknown.
Hence, certain instruments were built in several different models in an
attempt to achieve maximum authenticity. It is clear, however, that
quite a few problems have remained without a satisfactory solution. So
far, this experiment in building biblical instruments has remained
unique. There is still much to be done in the future. Until real
evidence of the exact details of instruments is found at excavations,
the reconstructions serve as the only estimate of how the biblical
people produced their sounds.
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This page updated: 17.1.12
CONTENTS
FOREWORD
Arnold Myers, Vice-President, CIMCIM, Edinburgh
INTRODUCTION
Jeannine Lambrechts-Douillez, Antwerp
REFLECTIONS ON THE `AUTHENTICITY' OF MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS
Martin Elste, Musikinstrumenten-Museum, Staatliches Institut für
Musikforschung Preussischer Kulturbesitzt, Berlin
What are `original instruments'? To answer this question is not a
matter of a couple of sentences. We have to search how this phrase has
been used over the years and how its meaning has changed. Further we
have to answer the question as to what extent it is useful to speak of
`original instruments'. The word `original' appears in the English
language as early as during the 14th century in the meaning of `that
existed at first, initial, earliest'. During the 17th century it also
became the meaning of `a work produced first-hand by the maker, a work
of art that is not a copy or imitation'. And eventually during the 18th
century a further meaning evolved: `A thing of singular or unique
character'.
So we see the term `original instruments' covers a variety of
possibilities. Any normative definition of the term does not take into
account its historical and aesthetic kaleidoscopic perspective. Thus I
do not want to give yet another definition of `original instruments'.
Regardless which possibility we refer to, there are important
considerations as to the function and the meaning of `original
instruments'.
THE `EXACT COPY' AS A LEGITIMATE GOAL
John Koster, The Shrine to Music Museum, Vermillion, South Dakota
MEASURE FOR MEASUREMENT
Eszter Fontana, National Museum of Hungary, Budapest
RADIOGRAPHING MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS: A USEFUL METHOD IN ORGANOLOGICAL RESEARCH
Mia Awouters, Brussels
Anyway, the classical film (format 30 . 40) remains a useful medium for
smaller objects and the radiography of details from a bigger
instrument. The technique also proved to be adequate in defining
options for the restoration of instruments. For instance, the course of
the damage caused by woodworm can reveal the need for intervention.
THE PROVISION OF PLANS
Jeremy Montagu, The Bate Collection of Musical Instruments, Faculty of
Music, University of Oxford
MATERIALS FROM ENDANGERED SPECIES IN MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS
Laurence Libin, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
Different pre- and post-Convention categories govern transit of
material obtained before or after its species was listed. No import
permit is required even for Appendix I material that has a valid pre-
Convention certificate. Material from captive-bred or artificially
propagated sources requires other special certificates.
THE CLAVICYTHERIUM (c 1480) AND ITS `COPY' IN THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF MUSIC MUSEUM, LONDON
Elizabeth Wells, The Royal College of Music Museum, London
BUILDING BIBLICAL INSTRUMENTS
Nina Benzoor, the Haifa Music and Ethnology Museum, Israel