Musical Instruments

INSTRUMENTS AT A MINSTREL PERFORMANCE

introduction: This fanciful scene from Remede de Fortune by Guillaume de Machaut (1340) names a number of instruments, including some that cannot be identified.

But you should have seen after the meal
The minstrels who entered in generous number,
With shining hair and simple dress!
They played many varied harmonies.
For I saw there all in a group
Fiddle, rebec and gittern,
Lutes, morache, micanon,
Citols, and a psalterion,
Harp, tabour, trumpets, nakers,
Organs, more than ten pair of trumpets,
Bagpipes, flutes, chevretes,
Douceinnes, cymbals, clocettes,
Tymbres, flutes from Brittany,
And the large German horn,
Flutes from Scens, panpipes, whistles,
Muse d'Aussay, small trumpets,
Ceremonial trumpets, eles,
and monocords with only a single string,
And muse de blef all together.
And certainly, it seemed to me
That never was such a melody seen nor heard,
For each of them, according to the tone
Of his instrument, without discord
Plays on vielle, gittern, citole
Harp, trumpet, horn, flageolet,
Pipe, bellows, bagpipe, nakers
Or tabor and every sound that one can make
With fingers, quill and bow
I heard and saw in that park.

source: Le jugement du roy de Behaigne, and, Remede de fortune/Guillaume de Machaut. Ed. James I. Wimsatt and William W. Kibler (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1988): lines 3959–3988. Translation by Robert Taylor.

Loud Versus Soft.

Musical instruments were divided into two fairly discrete groups—loud and soft—each group having specific functions and repertories; the two groups were rarely mixed together. The "loud" instruments were trumpets, bagpipes, shawms (double-reed instruments rather like the modern oboe), and drums. These instruments were assigned ceremonial functions, mostly out of doors, and were never found in the company of voices. The remaining "soft" instruments—bowed and plucked strings, woodwinds, and keyboard instruments—were played individually or in ensembles; some of them accompanied voices. The instruments that are described in this section are those most often seen in visual art and mentioned in literature.

Trumpets.

Trumpets came in several sizes, shapes, and materials. Straight trumpets approximately six feet in length and often made of silver were the instruments usually associated with governmental authority. Military trumpets were approximately the same length and made of brass, but beginning in the fourteenth century they were, for practical reasons, folded (similar to a modern bugle). Another popular shape was one resembling an "S," which was used for the smaller trumpets (approximately four feet of pipe) that are often depicted being played at indoor ceremonies such as banquets. All trumpets were without valves or keys, which restricted their notes to those of the natural acoustic overtone series, that is, something similar to the sounds of a modern bugle call. By 1400 a trumpet with a sliding pipe was invented to allow the players to access the complete scale. This was refined by 1480 to a double slide, which improved both speed and accuracy. The new instrument was called trombone in Italy, sackbut in England, and saqbutte in France.

Shawms.

The shawm, also considered "loud," is a double-reed instrument much like an oboe. It resembles similar instruments popular in the Arab countries and is first depicted in Spanish sources of the late thirteenth century, suggesting that it had been introduced to Europe during the Arab or Moorish occupation of Spain. Since the shawm had a fairly large range and could play many of the chromatic notes, it was capable of performing all of the repertory of the period. By the mid-fourteenth century there were two sizes, the traditional alto range instrument and a newer one that played at a lower pitch (tenor range) called a bombarde because of its resemblance to a cannon. Instruments of these two sizes often performed in pairs. By the early fifteenth century an alto and tenor shawm were often depicted with a slide trumpet as a standard dance music ensemble.

Bagpipe.

The bagpipe is found throughout the Middle Ages in most areas of Asia and the Middle East as well as in Europe, with a heritage that goes back to ancient times. There are many different sizes and shapes, but what they all have in common is that the sound is made by squeezing a bag (originally the skin of a goat) and the melody is played on a chanter pipe with finger holes. Instruments could have one, two, or three drone pipes or even none, and there are examples of both one and two chanter pipes. The bagpipe is most often seen playing alone, mostly for dancers, and it is usually associated with rural or pastoral scenes.

Percussion.

The percussion instruments make up the final group in the "loud" category. The type most frequently depicted is nakers, a pair of small "kettle" drums, usually tied to the performer's waist or over the neck of a horse; tabor, a larger barrel-shaped drum, often called a "side drum," usually associated with the military; and tambourine, a hand-held instrument with jingles, which is usually depicted in conjunction with dancing.

Keyboard.

The keyboard group, considered "soft" instruments, included organs, harpsichords, and clavichords. Two types of organs were in common use: a portative organ (i.e. small and portable), which was usually held on the lap of the player and played with one hand while the other hand worked the bellows; and a larger positive organ that was not portable and was usually found in church, some of which had multiple keyboards, pedals, and several ranks of pipes. Medieval harpsichords were similar to those in use today. The earliest evidence of their existence comes from the mid-fifteenth century. They had a single keyboard with one wire string for each note, and a sounding device that plucked the strings with a pick called a plectrum, which could be made of leather or quill. The clavichord (also called exchequer in England) appears as early as the fourteenth century. It differs from the harpsichord in several ways: it had a very soft volume; it made its sound by striking the strings with a metal strip called a tangent; and some of its strings could make more than one pitch according to the amount of force applied to the key—that is, a stronger pressure would result in a higher pitch.

Woodwinds.

The woodwind group was quite small, including only the flute and the recorder. These instruments were similar to those of today, but without keys. Only the higher-pitched (soprano) members of these families existed until late in the fifteenth century. The flute is often depicted with drums in a military setting, while the recorder was used for domestic music making.

Bowed Strings.

Bowed strings in the Middle Ages ranged from those that are obvious ancestors of modern instruments to some that are much less familiar. One of those that is less well known today was the hurdy-gurdy, which made its sound by the turning of a crank that caused a wheel to scrape against two or three strings. A set of keys or levers could be pressed against one of the strings to change the pitch, while the other(s) provided a drone. By the late Middle Ages it was played by a single performer, usually in a lower-class setting, but an earlier version, known as an organistrum or symphonia, requiring two performers, can be found depicted in a sacred setting in the form of stone sculptures on Gothic churches. Other bowed instruments of the period were distinguished mainly by size and pitch. The rebec, a small three-string instrument, played in the soprano range, while the vielle (Italian viola, English fiddle) was a four-or five-string instrument with a range similar to a modern viola. In Italy the lira da braccio was used to accompany improvised song. It was a bit larger than a vielle/viola although it was still played while held against the shoulder. It had seven strings, five of which could be "stopped" (i.e. the player could change the pitch with the fingers of his left hand, similar to a modern violin), and two more that were plucked by the thumb of the left hand, adding a strummed drone.

Plucked Strings.

Lutes came in several sizes, with frets and four "courses" (paired sets) of strings and a fifth solo string called a chantarelle, used for playing melodies. During this period it was usually plucked with a quill plectrum and played mostly single-line melodies with drones. It is clearly descended from the Arab instrument oud. The gittern, in contrast, was smaller and higher-pitched than the lute. It also had frets and was plucked with a plectrum and is depicted with three to five single strings. The final member of the group was the harp. Although harps existed in a variety of sizes and forms, the instrument most often depicted was a small portable harp with 24 or 25 strings.

Music for Instruments.

Although musical instruments were present all through the period and were played at many different kinds of occasions, very little music intended solely for instruments has survived. The repertory of instrumentalists consisted mainly of improvised music and melodies that circulated aurally. The only materials recorded in written form were ornamented versions of some pieces originally written for voice and a small number of dances. It is clear that throughout the period instrumentalists often performed vocal music, but it was not until the period of the Renaissance, beginning at the very end of the fifteenth century, that we begin to find a sizable body of music specifically composed for instrumental performance.

sources

Edmund Bowles, "Haut and bas: The Grouping of Musical Instruments in the Middle Ages," Musica Disciplina 8 (1954): 115–140.

Sibyl Marcuse, A Survey of Musical Instruments (London: David and Charles, 1975).

Timothy J. McGee, "Medieval Instrumental Repertoire," in A Performer's Guide to Medieval Music. Ed. Ross W. Duffin (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000): 448–453.

Jeremy Montagu, The World of Medieval and Renaissance Musical Instruments (London: David and Charles, 1976).

Keith Polk, "Ensemble Performance in Dufay's Time," in Dufay Quincentenary Conference. Ed. Allan W. Atlas (Brooklyn: Brooklyn College, 1976): 61–75.