- A rebec and a "boat shaped" sardino pochette
- Pochettes
- Two pochettes (the one on the left being a sardino and the one on the right a kit) in the Horniman Museum, London, UK.
- Two so called "pear shaped" pochettes
Other names | Kytte, treble violin; creytertjes; poche, kit violin, dancing master's kit, pochette d’amour, sourdine; Posch, Tanzmeistergeige, Taschengeige, Trögl-geige; canino, pochetto, sordina, sordino; linterculus [1] |
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The pochette is a small stringed instrument of the bowed variety. It is essentially a very small violin-like wood instrument designed to fit in a pocket, hence its common name, the "pochette" (French for small pocket).
Also known as a pocket fiddle it was developed to be used by dance masters in royal courts and other places of nobility, and by street musicians, from about the 15th century until around the 19th century, with it being especially popular in the 1800s. [2] In the past the rebec was used in a similar way.
A common misconception is that pochettes were intended for children. They were actually conceived for adults; their small size allowed them to be used where the larger violins were too cumbersome to carry, or too expensive to own. The instrument's body is very small, but its fingerboard is long relative to the instrument's overall size, to preserve as much of the instrument's melodic range as possible. Pochettes come in many shapes, with the narrow boat shaped ones called "sardinos" being one of the most common, along with the pear-shaped type. [2] A pochette shaped like a violin is called a "kit violin".
Trichet[ clarification needed ] is said to have described the pochette's leather carrying case as a poche. Similarly, Mersenne wrote that it was common practice among pochette players (such as traveling minstrels or dance teachers) to carry the instrument in a pocket. The word "kit" possibly arose from an abbreviation of the word "pocket" to "-cket" and subsequently "kit"; [3] alternatively, it may be a corruption of "cittern" (Greek : κιθάρα). [4] The word "Kit" is believed to have first been used in the first quarter of the 16th century England where it was mentioned in Interlude of the Four Elements, c. 1517. It is possible that the word "kit" originally referred to a small rebec, which was used in the same manner at the time in England, but came to belong to the violin shaped pochettes later on as it replaced the rebec. [5]
Many fiddlers in the 18th century used pochettes because of their portability. The pochette or pocket fiddle was used by dance masters not only during dances, but when teaching as well.
The great luthier Antonio Stradivari is known to have made a few pochettes in his career, two are known to have survived to modern times, one possibly in bad shape, and the other on display at the Conservatoire de Paris Museum. [6]
The pochette tends to be tuned one octave above a violin. [7] The three string variant specifically tends to be tuned the highest. [8]
Claudio Monteverdi used the "chirp" sound of the pochette to infer bird song in his aria "Ecco pur ch'a voi ritorno" from the 1607 opera L'Orfeo . [9] In the opera they are called violini piccoli alla francese ("small French violins"). [10]
The Fellowship of Makers and Restorers of Historical Instruments has expressed that even with a soundpost a violin cannot imitate the sound of a pochette enough for the two to be considered the same. [11]
Due to being an essential feature of court entertainment and dance, pochettes were often made of expensive materials such as exotic woods, tortoise shells or ivory, as well as being decorated with elaborate carvings. [12]
A pochette shaped like a boat is called a sardino (or Tanzmeistergeige in Germany), [13] while a violin-shaped one is called a kit. [14]
In general pochettes have a narrower body and longer neck in overall relation to its size compared to other bowed string instruments. They often lack frets and have either four or three strings. [15] They also often have a distinctly vaulted and arched back. [8] A pochette is distinguishable from the rest of the violin family due to the fact that the neck is a prolongation of the body, instead of simply being attached to it. [16]
The Fellowship of Makers and Restorers of Historical Instruments has expressed that a pochette's strings ought not to be longer than ten inches (25 cm). [11]
Due to their small size, pochettes cannot be played resting on the chin or shoulder like a violin, and are instead pressed against the chest or along the upper arm, being played with a short bow. [17] [3]
The violin, sometimes known as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular use. The violin typically has four strings, usually tuned in perfect fifths with notes G3, D4, A4, E5, and is most commonly played by drawing a bow across its strings. It can also be played by plucking the strings with the fingers (pizzicato) and, in specialized cases, by striking the strings with the wooden side of the bow.
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner.
The rebec is a bowed stringed instrument of the Medieval era and the early Renaissance. In its most common form, it has a narrow boat-shaped body and one to five strings.
The crwth is a bowed lyre, a type of stringed instrument, associated particularly with Welsh music, now archaic but once widely played in Europe. Four historical examples have survived and are to be found in St Fagans National Museum of History (Cardiff); National Library of Wales (Aberystwyth); Warrington Museum & Art Gallery; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (US).
The vielle is a European bowed stringed instrument used in the medieval period, similar to a modern violin but with a somewhat longer and deeper body, three to five gut strings, and a leaf-shaped pegbox with frontal tuning pegs, sometimes with a figure-8 shaped body. Whatever external form they had, the box-soundchest consisted of back and belly joined by ribs, which experience has shown to be the construction for bowed instruments. The most common shape given to the earliest vielles in France was an oval, which with its modifications remained in favour until the Italian lira da braccio asserted itself as the better type, leading to the violin.
A luthier is a craftsperson who builds or repairs string instruments that have a neck and a sound box. The word "luthier" is originally French and comes from the French word for lute. The term was originally used for makers of lutes, but it came to be used already in French for makers of most bowed and plucked stringed instruments such as members of the violin family and guitars. Luthiers, however, do not make harps or pianos; these require different skills and construction methods because their strings are secured to a frame.
Catgut is a type of cord that is prepared from the natural fiber found in the walls of animal intestines. Catgut makers usually use sheep or goat intestines, but occasionally use the intestines of cattle, hogs, horses, mules, or donkeys. Despite the name, catgut is not made from cat intestines.
Bowed string instruments are a subcategory of string instruments that are played by a bow rubbing the strings. The bow rubbing the string causes vibration which the instrument emits as sound.
The rebab is the name of several related string instruments that independently spread via Islamic trading routes over much of North Africa, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and parts of Europe. The instrument is typically bowed, but is sometimes plucked. It is one of the earliest known bowed instruments, named no later than the 8th century, and is the parent of many bowed and stringed instruments.
Kemenche or Lyra is a name used for various types of stringed bowed musical instruments originating in the Eastern Mediterranean, particularly in Armenia, Greece, Iran, Turkey, and Azerbaijan. and regions adjacent to the Black Sea. These instruments are folk instruments, generally having three strings and played held upright with their tail on the knee of the musician. The name Kemenche derives from the Persian Kamancheh, meaning merely a "small bow".
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.
The violin, viola and cello were first built in the early 16th century, in Italy. The earliest evidence for their existence is in paintings by Gaudenzio Ferrari from the 1530s, though Ferrari's instruments had only three strings. The Académie musicale, a treatise written in 1556 by Philibert Jambe de Fer, gives a clear description of the violin family much as we know it today.
Acoustic music is music that solely or primarily uses instruments that produce sound through acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means. While all music was once acoustic, the retronym "acoustic music" appeared after the advent of electric instruments, such as the electric guitar, electric violin, electric organ and synthesizer. Acoustic string instrumentations had long been a subset of popular music, particularly in folk. It stood in contrast to various other types of music in various eras, including big band music in the pre-rock era, and electric music in the rock era.
The bladder fiddle was a folk instrument used throughout Europe and in the Americas. The instrument was originally a simple large stringed fiddle made with a long stick, one or more thick gut strings, and a pig's-bladder resonator. It was bowed with either a notched stick or a horsehair bow.
The Byzantine lyra or lira was a medieval bowed string musical instrument in the Byzantine Empire. In its popular form, the lyra was a pear-shaped instrument with three to five strings, held upright and played by stopping the strings from the side with fingernails. The first known depiction of the instrument is on a Byzantine ivory casket, preserved in the Bargello in Florence. Versions of the Byzantine lyra are still played throughout the former lands of the Byzantine Empire: Greece, Crete, Albania, Montenegro, Serbia, Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Croatia, Italy and Armenia.
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.
The Kemençe of the Black Sea is a Greek and Turkish traditional musical instrument. It belongs to the category of stringed bowed musical instruments. It has three strings, usually tuned to perfect fourths, usually tuned B-E-A. It is the pre-eminent musical folk instrument of the Greeks of Pontus. It seems to have been invented during the Byzantine years, between the 11th and 12th centuries. The instrument is made of different types of wood.
The classicalkemenche, Armudî kemençe or Politiki lyra is a pear-shaped bowed instrument that derived from the medieval Greek byzantine lyre.
Richard Tobin was an Irish luthier and maker of violins, violas, cellos and pochettes. Tobin's work was largely uncredited, often branded under the names of his employers and other shops that enlisted him for his sought-after workmanship.
The Maghreb rebab is a bowed lute now played mainly in Northern Africa. It fits within the wider rebab traditions of the Arab world, but also branched into European musical tradition in Spain, Sicily, and the Holy Roman Empire. In the late Middle Ages, the European rebec developed from this instrument. The Maghreb rebab was described by a musicologist as the "predominant" rebab of North Africa, although the instrument was in decline with younger generations when that was published in 1984.
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