The Blackbird, also called the Black Stone Violin, is a full-size playable violin made of black diabase after drawings by Antonio Stradivari (Stradivarius), but with technical modifications to allow it to be played. The violin was conceived and designed by the Swedish artist Lars Widenfalk. It was named 'Blackbird' after the common blackbird (Turdus merula) because of its coloring.
The idea of constructing a musical instrument from stone came when Lars Widenfalk was working on big diabase blocks destined to form part of the artistic embellishment of the Norwegian TV building in Oslo, Norway.[ citation needed ] Each rock has a unique composition so they vibrate in different manners, producing a sound characteristic to that type of rock.
In 1990 Widenfalk acquired a small diabase block of high quality and blackness. It probably came from the quarries of northern Skåne in southern Sweden. [1] It became clear to him that the size was right for an instrument such as a violin. The rock came from his grandfather's tombstone, which had been discarded after a joint family grave had been established. [2] What made Widenfalk start to work on a violin was the desire to discover how far stone, in this case diabase, could be pushed as an artistic material, and he turned it into the world's first playable stone violin. [1]
Diabase is a black igneous rock with a dense and finely crystalline structure. The rock used for the belly and neck of the violin is about 1.6 billion years old. However, the source tombstone was not large enough for the whole violin. Therefore, the back plate was made of another stone, a porphyritic diabase, about 1.9 billion years old, from the province of Härjedalen in south central Sweden. [1] The stone violin is constructed to the designs of Stradivarius, but it uses Widenfalk's own technical modifications to allow it to be played. It weighs 2 kilograms (4.4 lb) and took two years to construct, being completed in 1992.
The sound box of the violin is 2.5 mm (0.098 in) thick. It was made with highest precision and constructed with sound-holes, back and graceful scroll. The ribs (sound box wall) were made in one piece by first sawing out a 30 mm (1.2 in) thick plate shaped to form the external violin contour. Then the inside was removed using a waterjet and machined with hand tools to create a thin rib, no more than a couple of millimetres thick at its thinnest point. The interior of the box was gilded with gold. The fingerboard is made of ebony. Precision bonding of the sound box parts was done using two component glue and the neck secured with two silvered steel pins where it joins the body. The bridge is formed from a piece of mammoth ivory from Siberia, the yellowest available, symbolising the blackbird's yellow beak. [1]
The Blackbird is not the only stone violin; the Czech sculptor Jan Řeřicha has made some stone violins. [3] They are made from marble, a much softer stone and easier to process than diabase, and weigh between 3.6 and 6.5 kilograms (7.9 and 14.3 lb). [3]
The Swedish composer Sven-David Sandström composed music specifically for the instrument. [4] The music's first public performance on the Blackbird took place in the Swedish Pavilion at the 1992 Seville Expo in Spain. In the same year the violin was blessed by Pope John Paul II in Rome. [5] Since then, it has been played in many places including Dubai, [6] Luxembourg, Monza, Milan, Nuremberg, Oslo, [7] Prague, Stockholm and Washington. A video from Face II Face, [8] the Lars Holm and Lars Widenfalk art exhibition in Linneanum, Botanical Garden, Uppsala 2009, includes a 30-second segment of a performance on the violin. [9]
The cello ( CHEL-oh), or violoncello ( VY-ə-lən-CHEL-oh, Italian pronunciation:[vjolonˈtʃɛllo]), is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G2, D3 and A3. The viola's four strings are each an octave higher. Music for the cello is generally written in the bass clef, with tenor clef, and treble clef used for higher-range passages.
Much has been learned about early music in Norway from physical artifacts found during archaeological digs. These include instruments such as the lur. Viking and medieval sagas also describe musical activity, as do the accounts of priests and pilgrims from all over Europe coming to visit St Olav's grave in Trondheim.
Turbonegro is a Norwegian rock band, active from 1989 to 1998 and from 2002 to the present. The band combines glam rock, punk rock, and hard rock into a self-described "deathpunk" musical style.
Christian August Sinding was a Norwegian composer. He is best known for his lyrical work for piano Frühlingsrauschen. He was often compared to Edvard Grieg and regarded as his successor.
A Hardanger fiddle is a traditional stringed instrument considered to be the national instrument of Norway. In modern designs, this type of fiddle is very similar to the violin, though with eight or nine strings and thinner wood. The F-holes of the Hardanger fiddle are distinctive, oftentimes with a more "sunken" appearance, and generally straighter edges. Four of the strings are strung and played like a violin, while the rest, named understrings or sympathetic strings, resonate under the influence of the other four. These extra strings are tuned and secured with extra pegs at the top of the scroll, effectively doubling the length of a Hardingfele scroll when compared to a violin. The sympathetic strings, once fastened to their pegs, are funneled through a "hollow" constructed fingerboard, which is built differently than a violin's, being slightly higher and thicker to allow for these extra strings. The resonant strings lie on the center of the special bridge, attached to extra hooks on the tailpiece. Carved out within the center of the bridge is a smaller secondary "bridge", or opening, designed specifically for these resonant strings to pass through. This is where the resonance is picked up and reverberated; as notes are played, the vibrations are sent through the bridge, where the sympathetics echo those notes.
Akershus Fortress or Akershus Castle is a medieval castle in the Norwegian capital Oslo that was built to protect and provide a royal residence for the city. Since the Middle Ages the fortress has been the namesake and centre of the main fief and later main county of Akershus, which was originally one of Norway's four main regions and which included most of Eastern Norway. The fortress itself was located within the Akershus main county until 1919, and also within the smaller Akershus sub county until 1842.
Tommy Flåten, best known by his stage name Tommy Tee, is a Norwegian record producer, rapper, broadcaster, record executive, concert promoter and magazine publisher. He is known as the godfather of Norwegian hip hop. Tee owns the label Tee Productions, which is located in Oslo, Norway and is Norway's leading hip hop label. As well, he publishes Norway's only graffiti magazine and hosts a weekly national rap radio program.
Bohus Fortress lies along the old Norwegian–Swedish border in Kungälv, Bohuslän, Sweden, north east from Hisingen where the Göta river splits into two branches. It commands the surrounding area from a cliff 40 m (130 ft) high, with the river forming a natural moat around it.
Fulufjället National Park is a national park in central Sweden. Its total area is 385 km2 (149 sq mi), located entirely within Älvdalen Municipality in the province of Dalarna. It is named after the mountain Fulufjället, 1,044 m (3,425 ft) high. It covers the Swedish part of the Fulufjället massif, which is the southernmost part of the Scandes in Sweden. The Norwegian part of the massif is protected by Norway's Fulufjellet National Park.
Making an instrument of the violin family, also called lutherie, may be done in different ways, many of which have changed very little in nearly 500 years since the first violins were made. Some violins, called "bench-made" instruments, are made by a single individual, either a master maker or an advanced amateur, working alone. Several people may participate in the making of a "shop-made" instrument, working under the supervision of a master. This was the preferred method of old violin makers who always put their names on violins crafted by their apprentices. Various levels of "trade violin" exist, often mass-produced by workers who each focus on a small part of the overall job, with or without the aid of machinery.
The Nordic Council Music Prize is awarded annually by NOMUS, the Nordic Music Committee. Every two years it is awarded for a work by a living composer. In the intervening years it is awarded to a performing musician or ensemble.
Träd, Gräs & Stenar is a Swedish rock band formed in 1969, from previous incarnations Pärson Sound, International Harvester and Harvester. The group was one of the front acts of the Swedish progg scene, although noticeably less political than their contemporary counterparts. Their sound has been described as raw, psych rock jam, by the writer David Pescovitz, who also notes the band would invite their audiences to improvise and collaborate.
Blood Tsunami is a Norwegian thrash metal band from Oslo, formed by Peter Michael Kolstad Vegem in 2004 and currently signed to Indie Recordings.
Christen Sveaas is a Norwegian businessman, investor, art collector and donor. He is the founder and sole owner of Kistefos AS, vice chairman of the board of the Kistefos Museum and chairman of the board of Anders Sveaas Allmennyttige Fond.
Lars Amund Vaage was born in 1952 at Sunde, Kvinnherad on the west coast of Norway, and studied classical piano at the Bergen Music Conservatory. He made his literary debut in 1979 with the novel Exercise Cold Winter, and has since published award-winning novels, short stories and collections of poetry, and a long essay on the art of storytelling, Sorrow and Song, 2016. In 1995 he had a definitive breakthrough in Norway with the Critics’ Prize-winning novel Rubato. In 2012, his acclaimed novel Sing, based on his experience of being the parent of a severely autistic child, was a national bestseller, winning the national Brage Prize and nominated for the Critics’ Prize. It has since become a classic.
Karl Johan Schuster, known professionally as Shellback, is a Swedish record producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. Shellback was listed as the No. 1 producer of 2012 on Billboard magazine's year end chart, and he also topped the list of their "Top 10 Songwriters Airplay Chart" the same year; he has won four Grammy Awards.
Svante Henryson is a composer, cellist, bass guitarist and double bassist, active within jazz, classical music, and hard rock.
Alena Matejka is a Czech sculptor and glass designer. She also works with other materials, often in combination.
Lars Widenfalk is a Swedish artist who works as a sculptor in Sweden, the Czech Republic and Italy. He is considered to have helped renewed figurative expression in Nordic sculpture. He works with many materials, from bronze, snow and ice. But his main material is stone, usually marble and granite. In recent years, he has also worked with glass. He is married to the Czech artist Alena Matejka.
Guro Skumsnes Moe is a Norwegian Upright bass player, electric bass player, composer and singer. Dance, improvisation, rock, jazz and noise music, are all elements that are important to her expression.