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Significant innovations by Debain’s fellow Parisian Jacob Alexandre opened up still more expressive options for the player blessed with skill and ear. But the massive expansion of the ‘everyday’ harmonium market in the 19th century was sparked when an Alexandre employee migrated to the US, taking with him a key idea.
- French Connection
- Changing Hands
- A Second Life in India
- Discordant Note
- Growing Acceptance
- A Global Reemergence
Professor Kratzenstein did not produce a monster; his creation was quite the opposite. When he was not conducting physiology experiments, Kratzenstein indulged in music. He was fascinated by the sheng, a Chinese free-reed instrument shaped like a vertical pipe. Marco Polo had introduced the sheng to Europe centuries earlier, and by the 1700s shengs...
Harmoniums were lighter in weight and smaller in size than organs and therefore easier to transport and less liable to be damaged in transit. Due to this, many reasonably affluent families ordered one for their living room. Heat and humidity did not affect harmoniums as much as they did pianos, so it was also suitable to ship to the tropical coloni...
Or was it? Another story had been playing out on the opposite side of the world. The portability of the harmonium (relative to the organ, the harpsichord and the piano), and its heat resistance meant that the British could export the instrument to their colonies for their homes and their churches there. Thus, several European harmoniums made their ...
The partition of the state of Bengal in 1905 into East and West Bengal by the British sparked off the nationalist Swadeshi movement. One of its tenets was that anything British was to be rejected, that which was Indian favoured. And the harmonium (never mind that it originated from continental Europe, not Britain) became a target. In the pre-harmon...
The instrument initially was the darling of Rabindranath Tagore, who used it to compose many of his songs, although he later not only fell out of love because of its musical limitations but condemned it outright and forbade its use in his residential school, Santiniketan. But the harmonium was not without its champions. Lions of Indian classical mu...
The European harmonium is, for all practical purposes, dead and extinct, only to be found in antique shops, museums, and in the homes of collectors of musical instruments. It does give little gasps and hiccups now and then from the grave. The Beatles used it in many of their songs, including “The Inner Light,” “Doctor Robert,” “We Can Work It Out,”...
Sep 16, 2013 · “The harmonium has not appeared in the broadcast of Karnatak music from AIR as an accompanying or solo instrument. Even in Hindusthani music, the instrument has only been tentatively introduced. We have not received orders from the Directorate to introduce the harmonium in Karnatak music.
Harmonium, free-reed keyboard instrument that produces sound when wind sent by foot-operated bellows through a pressure-equalizing air reservoir causes metal reeds screwed over slots in metal frames to vibrate through the frames with close tolerance.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Feb 13, 2023 · The harmonium has its roots in Europe, specifically in the mechanical organ. The first version of the instrument, known as the reed organ, was invented in 1842 by Alexandre Debain. The reed organ was a portable keyboard instrument that used air to vibrate metal reeds and produce sound.
An Organino, made by the Parisian François-Alexandre Débain (1809-1877) had two notes an octave apart on each key (like 8 ft and 4 ft pipe organ stop pitches), and when Débain put four stops on one keyboard he called it a harmonium. The various sized tone channels produced different tone qualities.
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Jonathan Scott presents an introduction to the instrument known as The Harmonium, including the history, sound, and how it works, with examples on instrument...
- 12 min
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- scottbrothersduo
