Benjamin Franklin’s Glass Armonica,Ben Franklin really was a genius of his time. Founding Fat
Benjamin Franklin’s Glass Armonica,Ben Franklin really was a genius of his time. Founding Father, ambassador, statesman, inventor, scientist, writer, printer, and ladies man, there are scores of different roles Franklin filled throughout his life. One little known role he occupied was that of musician.An inventor of many strange and revolutionary gadgets, perhaps his least known today is a unique musical instrument called the “glass armonica”. While living in London in 1761 Franklin heard a street performer playing musical glasses. Ever take a wet finger and rub it around the rim of a wine glass to produce a sound? The performer was essentially doing the same, only with a whole collection of glasses of different size and shape. According to Franklin, “He collected a number of glasses of different sizes, fixed them near each other on a table, and tuned them by putting into them water, more or less as each note required. The tones were brought out by passing his fingers round their brims." Franklin loved the music and was inspired to improve upon the idea. He had a glassmaker produce 37 hemisphere’s of glass, each of consecutively larger sizes to produce different pitches. The hemisphere’s were mounted horizontally on a spinning wheel or lathe. By working a foot pedal the wheel would spin, and Franklin played the armonica by placing wet fingers on the rim of each hemisphere which produced a soft, ethereal, mournful sound.Franklin loved his new contraption, becoming a master armonica player and even composing his own music. Ben Franklin was a big time socialite and parygoer. To show off his invention Franklin played his armonica to friends and acquaintances at parties all over Europe and America. His travels kicked off a musical fad as thousands of armonica’s were produced and sold. Soon popular musicians of the day took up the glass armonica. Legendary classical composers such as Mozart, Handel, Beethoven, Strauss, as well as 100 other composers created compositions for the armonica.The armonica lost popularity in the 19th century. Some musicians claimed that the sound from the armonica was bad for the nerves. More importantly the armonica produced a soft sound, which was not practical for the grand symphonies of the 19th century. The glass armonica would be rediscovered in 1920’s and 1980’s. Today many modern classical composers are once again integrating Ben Franklin’s glass armonica into their music. -- source link
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