Cymbals

“ The rhythmic beat of drums and cymbals, the shrill, strident notes of the fife, the quaint, quavering tones of the pipe and clarinet, mingle in a strain jocosely mirthful, rather than truly gay, and becoming more insistent as it advances. ”

“ The strings sing the principal theme. After an allegro passage (some will find here the thought of the ascending lark) , there is a return to the serener mood of the opening; antique cymbals hint at the sparkle of the dew on the hay. The music keeps pace with the mounting eagerness and desire of the poet-lover; the excitement grows, reaching its climax in an effulgent outburst of the full orchestra, announcing the rising sun. ”

“ So that the foam and the iridescence, the music that comes from the cymbals, all formed things that come from perfect union in opposition, all beauty and all truth and being, all perfection, these are the be-all and the end-all, absolute, timeless, beyond time or eternity, beyond the Limit or the Infinite. ”

“ Beautiful it sings between the quick phrases, with a certain shock of change, and there is the terror of a sudden low rumbling and the thrill of new murmuring sounds with soft beat of drum that hails the gathering fairies. There is a sudden clarion burst of the whole chorus, with clash of drum and clang of brass, and sudden pause, then faintest echoes of higher voices.
A new figure now dances a joyous measure to the tinkling of harp and the sparkling strokes of high
cymbals and long blown tone of horns. ”

“ The sound is obtained not by clashing them against each other, but by rubbing their edges together by a sliding movement. Sometimes a weird effect is obtained by suspending one of the cymbals by the strap and letting a drummer execute a roll upon it as it swings; or by holding a cymbal in the left hand and striking it with the soft stick of the bass drum, which produces a sound akin to that of the tam-tam. All gradations of piano and forte can be obtained on the cymbals. ”

“ The strident tones were unmistakeable, the product, in so far as the human throat can compass it, of a long and careful assimilation of the clash of the cymbals.
“A rare fine buildin’, this,” said one, “and what a hinstrument! I only wish we ’ad it in our place; draw a sight better than drums and cymbals, wouldn’t it? And a deal noisier.”
“You’re right,” answered the other, “but, for all that, I wouldn’t exchange with that lot to get it. ”

“ It is hard to say whether the composer's emotion or his counterpoint is given freer rein here, for the work is remarkable both for the display of every technical resource and for the irresistible tempest of its passion.... The cheerful consolation of the second subject provokes a cyclonic outburst of grief; there is a furious climax of thrilling flutes and violins over a mad blare of brass, the while the cymbals shiver beneath the blows of the kettle-drum-sticks. An abrupt silence prepares for a fierce, thunderous clamor from the kettle-drums and the great drum. ”

“ For as one kind of instrument, as the drum, produces but one note; and another, as the cymbals, but a clashing which is in itself discordant, but made effective in a band; so others are, like the most delicate and sensitive violins—those of Cremona—capable of producing the finest music that the soul of man hath ever devised. It is by such music, child, that some of us mount unto heaven. ”

“ Here in the fourth court the drums that maiden fingers beat are booming like the thunder; the cymbals are falling, as the stars fall from heaven when their merit is exhausted; [5] the pipe is discoursing music as sweet as the humming of bees. And here, again, is a lute that somebody is holding on his lap like a girl who is excited by jealousy and love, and he is stroking it with his fingers. ”

“ A bass-drum would thunder down, breaking the back at a stroke of a long roll proceeding from a tenor one near by, whilst another of the latter species would rub-a-dub right into a pair of cymbals, and scatter their silver clashings into an entire route. New tunes would be constantly arriving as the distant companies came marching up to give fresh life to the wrangling discord, whilst to add to the uproar, the whole pack of pedlers, amounting to nearly a dozen, had given tongue at the first hurly-burly of the music, bursting out, as it were, in full cry. ”

“ Kettle drums, bass drums, xylophones, Chinese gongs, vibraphones, snare drums and high-hat cymbals paraded by in carts, banged and stroked and tinkled enthusiastically by crew after crew of maddened tympanists. And then came the others, on foot: tambourines and wood blocks and parade cymbals and castanets. At the tail of this portion of the Procession came a single old man wearing spectacles and riding in a small cart drawn by a donkey. ”

“ One double drum, I noticed, was made from reversed sections of human skulls, and my attention was also attracted by some peculiar headgear worn by the Lamas during their services and ceremonies. On these occasions they not only accompany their chanting and prayers with the beating of drums and clashing of cymbals, but they at the same time make a noise on cane flutes, tinkle hand-bells, and sound a large gong. ”

“ To the sound of a kind of tambourine and brazen cymbals, these ladies step forward, raise their arms in the air, indulge without any preface in a variety of those contortions of trunk and shoulders which are the fundamental principle of all Oriental dances, and cast on their patron glances which, they do their best to make appear ardent. ”

“ The woman has eight or nine cymbals secured to her legs before and behind, and she strikes these rapidly in turn with another held in her hand, twisting her body skilfully so as to reach all of them, and keeping time with the music played on guitar-like instruments by the men who accompany her. If the woman is especially skilful, she will also hold a naked sword in her mouth, so as to increase the difficulty of the performance. ”

“ Damping gives a suggestion of impending evil or tragedy. The timbre of the ancient cymbals is entirely different, more like that of small hand-bells or of the notes of the keyed harmonica. They are not struck full against each other, but by one of their edges, and the note given out by them is higher in proportion as they are thicker and smaller. Berlioz in Romeo and Juliet scored for two pairs of cymbals, modelled on some ancient Pompeian instruments no larger than the hand (some are no larger than a crown piece) , and tuned to and . ”

“ Suddenly the music took on a louder tone arid several men with clashing cymbals joined in. The auditors, too, fell flat on their faces and Billy and Lathrop, on the former's suggestion, did the same.
"Not to do as the others are doing might cost us our heads," sagely remarked the diplomatic Billy, "and I need mine in my business."
Whatever the nature of the ceremony, it was now evidently approaching a climax. The chanting grew louder and more furious and the cymbal players clashed their huge metal instruments together with a deafening clangor. ”

“ For battle there is the confusion made of quick beats of the big drum. To increase the sound of the warlike preparations, a metal gong is struck rapidly, there is a clash of cymbals, and the blowing of a conch shell. ”

“ He increased the variety and usefulness of the instruments of percussion, forming out of them a new family of instruments to balance the families of the strings, brass, and wood-wind. In the score of the Second Symphony he calls for six timpani, bass and snare-drums, a high and a low tam-tam, cymbals, a triangle, glockenspiel, three deep-toned bells, in the chief orchestra; besides a bass-drum, triangle and cymbals in the supplementary. In the Eighth Symphony, the instruments of percussion form a little band by themselves. ”

“ And to those, it may be, he added the organ, to signify that they sound not each separately, but sound together in most harmonious diversity, just as they are arranged in a musical instrument. For even then the saints of God will have their differences, accordant, not discordant, that is, agreeing, not disagreeing, just as sweetest harmony arises from sounds differing indeed, but not opposed to one another.
6. “Praise Him on the well-sounding cymbals, praise Him on cymbals of jubilation” (ver. 5) . Cymbals touch one another in order to sound, and therefore are by some compared to our lips. ”

“ One of these archaic Cybele reliefs, brought from Piræus to the National Museum in Athens, shows the goddess with her lion in her lap, her cymbals in her hand. The “new theology,” fostered by Euripides and domiciled in daily life by the “New Comedy,” could treat these cymbals as typical of “a creed out-worn.” One of Menander’s characters exclaims:—
“No god, my wife, saves one man through another’s help,
For if a human being can by cymbals’ clash
Deflect the god to whatsoever is desired,
Then greater than the god is he that doeth this.” ”

“ A band of musicians is usually engaged, after protracted haggling, to enliven the proceedings. Two or three native fiddles of most primitive make wail incessantly, cymbals clash recklessly, a kind of flute resembling bagpipes in sound squirls, while a wooden drum adds to the deafening din. ”

“ It is from its relationship to the drum that the pianoforte derives a peculiarity quite unique in the melodic and harmonic family. Rhythm is, after all, the starting-point of music. More than melody, more than harmony, it stirs the blood of the savage, and since the most vital forces within man are those which date back to his primitive state, so the sense of rhythm is the most universal of the musical senses among even the most cultured of peoples to-day. By themselves the drums, triangles, and cymbals of an orchestra represent music but one remove from noise ”

“ The development of modern orchestral music has given dignity also to the bass drum, which, though definite pitch is denied to it, is now manipulated in a variety of ways productive of striking effects. Rolls are played on it with the sticks of the kettle-drums, and it has been emancipated measurably from the cymbals, which in vulgar brass-band music are its inseparable companions. ”

“ Among the 37 Roman instruments of percussion the scabillum, which consisted of two plates combined by means of a sort of hinge, deserves to be noticed; it was fastened under the foot and trodden in time, to produce certain rhythmical effects in musical performances. The cymbalum consisted of two metal plates similar to our cymbals. The crotala and the crusmata were kinds of castanets, the former being oblong and of a larger size than the latter. The Romans had also a triangulum, which resembled the triangle occasionally used in our orchestra. ”

“ Six or eight persons will get up, among whom one carries a drum and others two or three heavy cymbals and an instrument like an enormous iron castanet. The dancers form a compact circle and begin slowly chanting, accompanying their voices with the drum and the cymbals. ”

“ By their throwing themselves down before her, it is taught,” he says, “that they who cultivate the earth should not sit idle, for there is always something for them to do. The sound of the cymbals signifies the noise made by the throwing of iron utensils, and by men’s hands, and all other noises connected with agricultural operations ”

“ But lest any should understand such cymbals as sound without life, therefore I think he added, “on cymbals of jubilation.” For “jubilation” that is, unspeakable praise, proceedeth not, save from life. Nor do I think that I should pass over what musicians say, that there are three kinds of sounds, by voice, by breath, by striking: by voice, uttered by throat and windpipe, when man singeth without any instrument; by breath, as by pipe, or anything of that sort: by striking, as by harp, or anything of that kind. ”

“ It will be well perhaps to enumerate again the most common; they are the harp, fiddle, cittern or lute, hand-organ or dulcimer, the shalm or psaltery, the pipe and tabor, pipes of various sizes played like clarionets, but called flutes, the double pipe, hand-bells, trumpets and horns, bagpipes, tambourine, tabret, drum, and cymbals. We give two further groups of figures in illustration of these instruments, both taken from the Royal MS. so often quoted, 2 B. vii. In the first (No. 134) 190 we have a boy (apparently) playing the cymbals ”

“ The grating quality of the sound appears to be due to the little tongues which press on the nervures of the vibrating cymbals; the cause of its intensity is of course the ample resonator in the abdomen. We must admit that one must truly have a real passion for song before one would empty one's chest and stomach in order to make room for a musical-box. The necessary vital organs are extremely small, confined to a mere corner of the body, in order to increase the amplitude of the resonating cavity. ”

“ Every faith has its appropriate music, and the difference between the creeds might almost be expressed in musical notation. The interval, for example, which divides the wild revels of Cybele from the stately ritual of the Catholic Church is measured by the gulf which severs the dissonant clash of cymbals and tambourines from the grave harmonies of Palestrina and Handel. A different spirit breathes in the difference of the music. ”

“ Among the percussion instruments are tambourines, castanets and cymbals; they had wind instruments such as flutes (seldom transverse or blown in from the side, and often played by blowing on them through the nostrils) , trumpets, horns, bagpipes and oboes. Certain instruments were used only by the priests, others by beggars, and others by dancing girls. Imagine how weird a story could be told in music if a modern symphony orchestra played a piece of music telling of life among the Hindus. Maybe some of the readers of this book will get an idea for a Hindu tone poem, who knows? ”