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.
The viola ( vee-OH-lə, Italian:[ˈvjɔːla,viˈɔːla]) is a string instrument that is usually bowed. Slightly larger than a violin, it has a lower and deeper sound. Since the 18th century, it has been the middle or alto voice of the violin family, between the violin (which is tuned a perfect fifth higher) and the cello (which is tuned an octave lower). The strings from low to high are typically tuned to C3, G3, D4, and A4.
In musical instrument classification, string instruments or chordophones, are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner.
Walter Hamor Piston, Jr., was an American composer of classical music, music theorist, and professor of music at Harvard University.
Scordatura is a tuning of a string instrument that is different from the normal, standard tuning. It typically attempts to allow special effects or unusual chords or timbre, or to make certain passages easier to play. It is common to notate the finger position as if played in regular tuning, while the actual pitch resulting is altered. When all the strings are tuned by the same interval up or down, as in the case of the viola in Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola and Orchestra, the part is transposed as a whole.
Alfred Whitford (Fred) Lerdahl is the Fritz Reiner Professor Emeritus of Musical Composition at Columbia University, and a composer and music theorist best known for his work on musical grammar and cognition, rhythmic theory, pitch space, and cognitive constraints on compositional systems. He has written many orchestral and chamber works, three of which were finalists for the Pulitzer Prize for Music: Time after Time in 2001, String Quartet No. 3 in 2010, and Arches in 2011.
John Harris Harbison is an American composer, known for his symphonies, operas, and large choral works.
A viola concerto is a concerto contrasting a viola with another body of musical instruments such as an orchestra or chamber music ensemble. Throughout music history, especially during the Baroque, Classical, Romantic eras, viola was viewed mostly as an ensemble instrument. Though there were a few notable concertos written for the instrument in this time period, these instances were quite rare and the instrument continued to be ignored. However, during the 20th century, the instrument was revitalized thanks to the work of a number of violists and composers, which led to the commission and composition of many more viola concertos, expanding the repertoire significantly.
Concertino is the diminutive of concerto, thus literally a small or short concerto.
The violin family of musical instruments was developed in Italy in the 16th century. At the time the name of this family of instruments was viole da braccio which was used to distinguish them from the viol family. The standard modern violin family consists of the violin, viola, cello, and (possibly) double bass.
A music store or musical instrument store is a retail business that sells musical instruments and related equipment and accessories. Some music stores sell additional services, such as music lessons, music instrument or equipment rental, or repair services.
Giannini is a Brazilian musical instruments manufacturing company, based in Salto, São Paulo.
The string section is composed of bowed instruments belonging to the violin family. It normally consists of first and second violins, violas, cellos, and double basses. It is the most numerous group in the standard orchestra. In discussions of the instrumentation of a musical work, the phrase "the strings" or "and strings" is used to indicate a string section as just defined. An orchestra consisting solely of a string section is called a string orchestra. Smaller string sections are sometimes used in jazz, pop, and rock music and in the pit orchestras of musical theatre.
Edward Toner Cone was an American composer, music theorist, pianist, and philanthropist.
Lior Navok is an Israeli classical composer, conductor and pianist. He was born in Tel Aviv. His music has been performed internationally by orchestras and ensembles including the Oper Frankfurt, Nuernberg Opera, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Boston Modern Orchestra Project, and the Tanglewood Festival Orchestra. Amongst the awards he has received are those from the Israel Cultural Excellence Foundation and the Massachusetts Cultural Council. He has also received awards from the Fromm Music Foundation, Lili Boulanger Memorial Fund Award, and Israel Prime Minister Award. In 2004, he was one of seven composers awarded commissions for new musical works by the Serge Koussevitzky Foundation in the Library of Congress and the Koussevitzky Music Foundation.
Roger Bourland is an American composer, publisher, blogger, and Professor-Emeritus of Music at the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music.
Tarisio is the world's largest seller of fine stringed instruments and bows. Founded in 1999 as an auction house that specializes in string instruments and bows, Tarisio now has locations in New York, London and Berlin and serves a global clientele.
In music, a duodecet—sometimes duodectet, or duodecimette—is a composition which requires twelve musicians for a performance, or a musical group that consists of twelve people. In jazz, such a group of twelve players is sometimes called a "twelvetet". The corresponding German word is Duodezett. The French equivalent form, douzetuor, is virtually unknown. Unlike some other musical ensembles such as the string quartet, there is no established or standard set of instruments in a duodecet.
Andrea Amati was a luthier, from Cremona, Italy. Amati is credited with making the first instruments of the violin family that are in the form we use today. Several of his instruments survive to the present day, and some of them can still be played. Many of the surviving instruments were among a consignment of 38 instruments delivered to Charles IX of France in 1564.
