Re: [EK] Re: Kazoo Crazy!!

[Corun MacAnndra <corun@access.digex.net>]

Poster: Corun MacAnndra <corun@access.digex.net>

Shoshonah wrote:
> 
> Well, there's a few choices, and some of them will be irritating as all 
> get-out:

I think Henry is looking for something that will produce a musical scale
without having to use anything more than his own voice to do it. But;

>   Glasses of water used as bells - (woodcut from Theorica Musica in 1492)

I'm interested to know whether this woodcut depicts the glasses being
struck with some kind of mallet or stick or if the rims are being rubbed
with wetted fingers. It was my understanding that the Harmonica was invented
by Benjamin Franklin. I don't mean the reed instrument sometimes referred
to as a mouth organ and played around campfires by lonesome cowboys or
Civil War soldiers the night before a big battle. I mean a box containing
a set of glass bowls of graduated sizes, attached to a central axle and
nested one within another from largest to smallest, all sitting in a box
of water. The axle (and subsequently the glass bowls) are turned using
a tredle, and the instrument is played by touching the rims of the rotating
glasses lightly with the fingers. Mozart wrote several pieces for this
instrument. This isntrument makes a beautifully haunting sound. I believe
there is a harmonica at the Museum of American History at the Smithsonian.

Anyway, this is, I think, more complex than Henry wants to get in his
musical endeavours.

>   Jaw harp

Now this instrument would be more suited to what Henry wants to do, though
it does take some use of the hands to hold and pluck the thing. It does,
however, rely soley on the tones produced by one's voice to make anything
like music with it (see my previous note on the use of the jaw harp by
Mongolian khoomei singers).

>   I also recall reading something about musical saws - maybe in Lark in the
> Morning catalog.

Oh, that old saw? :-)

Hey Henry. We could make you a really tall washtub bass that you could
play from your stilts.

In service,
Corun



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