The double bass, also known simply as the bass, amongst other names, is the largest and, therefore, lowest-pitched chordophone in the modern symphony orchestra. Similar in structure to the cello, it has four, although occasionally five, strings.
Tuner may refer to someone or something which adjusts or configures a mechanical, electronic, or musical device.
The Floyd Rose Locking Tremolo, or simply Floyd Rose, is a type of locking vibrato arm for a guitar. Floyd D. Rose invented the locking vibrato in 1976, the first of its kind, and it is now manufactured by a company of the same name. The Floyd Rose gained popularity in the 1980s through guitarists like Eddie Van Halen, Neal Schon, Brad Gillis, Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, and Alex Lifeson, who used its ability to stay in tune even with extreme changes in pitch. Its tuning stability comes through the double-locking design that has been widely regarded as revolutionary; the design has been listed on Guitar World's "10 Most Earth Shaking Guitar Innovations" and Guitar Player's "101 Greatest Moments in Guitar History 1979–1983."
In music, inharmonicity is the degree to which the frequencies of overtones depart from whole multiples of the fundamental frequency.
A vibrato system on a guitar is a mechanical device used to temporarily change the pitch of the strings. They add vibrato to the sound by changing the tension of the strings, typically at the bridge or tailpiece of an electric guitar using a controlling lever, which is alternately referred to as a whammy bar, vibrato bar, or incorrectly as a tremolo arm. The lever enables the player to quickly and temporarily vary the tension and sometimes length of the strings, changing the pitch to create a vibrato, portamento, or pitch bend effect. Instruments without a vibrato have other bridge and tailpiece systems.
A tailpiece is a component on many stringed musical instruments that anchors one end of the strings, usually opposite the end with the tuning mechanism.
Floyd Rose SpeedLoader is a floating guitar bridge based on the Floyd Rose Original. In development since 1991, it was introduced to the public in 2003. This tremolo was developed in San Diego CA at AJ manufacturing by tool makers Jerry Morhman, Richard J Price, Steve Lamms, and Kerry L Stottlemyer under the direct guidance of Floyd Rose himself. With Richard J Price doing the majority of the design work and machining of the prototypes. Over 3000 hours and $150,000 were spent in developing this new ground breaking tremolo system and the first working unit on a guitar body. It inherited the locking floating bridge principle from the original version, but improved usability and diminished most of disadvantages that the Floyd Rose Original was criticized for, while adding the inconvenience of needing special-purpose strings. The Floyd Rose SpeedLoader is available in Tremolo, Fixed Bridge, and Convergent Tuning forms. However, the issues with strings became more apparent, as the specially made strings for the Speedloader were discontinued due to quality control issues. With no strings currently being manufactured, there is no way to properly string and set up any guitar with the Floyd Rose Speedloader. Customers have voiced their discontent with Floyd Rose for a lack of development of any parts that could remedy the situation.
A worm drive is a gear arrangement in which a worm meshes with a worm wheel. The two elements are also called the worm screw and worm gear. The terminology is often confused by imprecise use of the term worm gear to refer to the worm, the worm wheel, or the worm drive as a unit.
A nut, on a stringed musical instrument, is a small piece of hard material that supports the strings at the end closest to the headstock or scroll. The nut marks one end of the vibrating length of each open string, sets the spacing of the strings across the neck, and usually holds the strings at the proper height from the fingerboard. Along with the bridge, the nut defines the scale lengths of the open strings.
A variety of methods are used to tune different stringed instruments. Most change the pitch produced when the string is played by adjusting the tension of the strings.
A violin consists of a body or corpus, a neck, a finger board, a bridge, a soundpost, four strings, and various fittings. The fittings are the tuning pegs, tailpiece and tailgut, endpin, possibly one or more fine tuners on the tailpiece, and in the modern style of playing, usually a chinrest, either attached with the cup directly over the tailpiece or to the left of it. There are many variations of chinrests: center-mount types such as Flesch or Guarneri, clamped to the body on both sides of the tailpiece, and side-mount types clamped to the lower bout to the left of the tailpiece.
A tuning wrench is a specialized socket wrench used to tune string instruments, such as the piano, harp, and hammer dulcimer, that have strings wrapped around tuning pins. Other string instruments do not require a tuning wrench because their tuning pins or pegs come with handles, or geared tuning machines.
The Rickenbacker 360/12 is the Rickenbacker company's 12-string variant of their 360 electric guitar model. Mainly known for producing "jangly" sounds, it was among the first electric 12-string guitars. The 360/12 was given worldwide attention when George Harrison used it on many Beatles recordings, introducing the distinctive new sound of this guitar on "I Call Your Name", which the band recorded in March 1964. In the late 1960s, the company made alternative models such as the Rickenbacker 370/12, which became the favored instrument of Roger McGuinn of the Byrds.
A bridge is a device that supports the strings on a stringed musical instrument and transmits the vibration of those strings to another structural component of the instrument—typically a soundboard, such as the top of a guitar or violin—which transfers the sound to the surrounding air. Depending on the instrument, the bridge may be made of carved wood, metal or other materials. The bridge supports the strings and holds them over the body of the instrument under tension.
The Guitarrón Chileno is a guitar-shaped plucked string instrument from Chile, with 25 or 24 (rarely) strings. Its primary contemporary use is as the instrumental accompaniment for the traditional Chilean genre of singing poetry known as Canto a lo Poeta, though a few virtuosi have also begun to develop the instrument's solo possibilities.
The English guitar or guittar is a stringed instrument – a type of cittern – popular in many places in Europe from around 1750–1850. It is unknown when the identifier "English" became connected to the instrument: at the time of its introduction to Great Britain, and during its period of popularity, it was apparently simply known as guitar or guittar. The instrument was also known in Norway as a guitarre and France as cistre or guitarre allemande. There are many examples in Norwegian museums, like the Norsk Folkemuseum and in British ones, including the Victoria and Albert Museum. The English guitar has a pear-shaped body, a flat base, and a short neck. The instrument is also related to the Portuguese guitar and the German waldzither.
EverTune is an American company that produces the EverTune bridge, designed to keep guitar strings in tune.
Viola da terra is a stringed musical instrument from the islands of the Azores, closely associated with the saudade genre of Portuguese music. Its 12 or 15 metal strings are arranged in either five or six courses.
The Kluson Manufacturing Company, founded in 1925, was a prominent manufacturer of musical instrument tuning machines.
Roadie tuners are automatic stringed instrument tuners created and developed by the music-tech startup, Band Industries, Inc. Roadie 3, the last iteration in the Roadie tuner family is compatible with stringed instruments that have a guitar machine head including electric, acoustic, classical and steel guitars, 6-7-12 string guitars, ukuleles, mandolins and banjos. Roadie Bass is designed to tune bass guitars as well as the instruments Roadie 3 can tune.
