The main INSTRUMENTS of CLASSIC music

An instrument is an artifact that helps us do a job. Thanks to the creativity of the human being and his inventions, objects have been manufactured that have allowed us to shape our creative ideas. It is the case of music, where we use a wide variety of instruments to create sounds that will become pieces, songs or works.

Over time we evolve and create great things. In the history of music, excellence and grandeur reached the peak when composers sought the perfection and beauty, also new textures and colors that they would find through the combination of various instruments. It was the case of classical music. In this lesson from a TEACHER we will talk about classical music instruments.

What is classical music.

Before talking about the instruments of classical music we must know a bit of context. We will call you classic to something that has transcended in history and that

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has established certain parameters or guidelines for those who follow. As in all art, music has had rudimentary principles but has evolved through the experimentation and the accumulation of knowledge and the work of those who have taken it as a passion or job.

We must mention that classical music also has several eras that have their own tendencies, but if we must set dates, we could say that classical music is the music that begins to form from the 1000s, although the main characteristics of the genus were established during the period from 1550 to 1900 in the Western European region.

Classical music is so beautiful and great that hundreds of years later we are still listening to it, performing it and studying it in depth.

Classical Music Instruments - What is Classical Music

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Formations and characteristics of classical music.

To talk about classical music instruments it is also relevant that we talk about their groupings, since music was often part of a social event and therefore became an act of collaboration.

Soloists

Mostly musicians who were dedicated to mastering an instrument and becoming virtuous. We could say that the most popular instruments for this purpose were the harpsichord, the piano and the violin.

Chamber Groups

With the exception of the chamber orchestra, which had 25 members, the chamber groups They are made up of 2 to 5 members (duo, trio, quartet and quintet). These are small, multi-instrument ensembles with individual parts that could be played comfortably in a small room or bedroom. It was very common for small groups of musicians to create ensembles as entertainment for parties or social gatherings. The period of greatest splendor for this type of music was the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.

Symphonic Orchestra

We could say that the symphonic Orchestra it is the ultimate expression of classical music for its grandeur and complexity. The number of instrumentalists in the classical orchestra was around 25 musicians at first, but over time it expanded to 70 musicians, 100 musicians or even more.

A lots of composers They sought to create wonderful works such as symphonies, long-playing pieces and different movements that could played as the main act in a function, filling theaters for hundreds of people to enjoy the music. Some of these most iconic composers were Johann Sebastian Bach, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Peter Tchaikovsky and Sergei Rachmaninoff, among many other prodigies.

Instruments of classical music - Formations and characteristics of classical music

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The main instruments of classical music.

We can group classical music instruments into 3 large groups: string instruments, wind instruments and percussion instruments. Next we will mention the most important by category:

String instruments

The string instruments They are those who, as their name suggests, have strings. These can be stringed instruments rubbed, pulsed or percussed, which refers to the technique with which the instruments are played.

The most popular classical instruments of Rubbed rope they were the violin, viola, cello and double bass.
From Plucked we can mention the harp and the previous versions of what we know today as the guitar: the lute or the mandolin.
Finally we have the instruments of struck rope, which were extremely popular as house and concert instruments. These were the harpsichord (harpsichord or harpsichord), the clavichord and later, the piano and the celesta.

Wind instruments

They are instruments that produce sound through air passage. In general, they require the musician to blow with the mouth and have holes, keys or pistons that manipulate the space through which the wind travels to change the sound. Wind instruments are subdivided into woodwind instruments and brass instruments.

In instruments of woodwind The most widely used were the piccolo, the flute, the flute, the recorder, the oboe, the clarinet, the English horn and the bassoon.
Regarding instruments of metal wind more popular we find the trumpet, cornet, horn, trombone, euphonium (or euphonium) and the tuba.

Percussion instruments

Another of the instruments of classical music were the percussion instruments that produce sound when struck directly by hand or some other piece of aid. Some do not have specific assigned notes, others do and can create melodies, this classifies them into two basic groups: indefinite and definite height.

Of the instruments of percussion of undefined height we can mention the bass drum, the triangle, the suspended cymbal, the cymbals, and in not so old works, the box.
Some of the instruments of percussion with tuning They are the glockenspiel, the xylophone, the marimba and the ear tags. We can also include the timpani or eardrums, which are large drums that have a single assigned note but are usually played grouped in 2, 3 or sometimes 4.