RE:Vibraphone/xylophone/marimba in Klezmer music

[allen watsky <awatsky...>]

Hey J, So the 33 fair guy, Mr. Musser, is the inventor/innovator of the vibe
? yes ? The Musser One Nighter guy. Thats a fun factoid.  Despite one
listers assertion that Mr. Hoffman xylophonist of fame played on every
Kandel track I find him to be inaudible on the 20 or so Kandel sides I have
to listen to. I think Tsimble is a good move(nay! a great move), though the
tuning is a challenge; at least its user adjustable: which is a plus. AW
----- Original Message -----
From: "Jonathan Simon" <jonathan_s_simon (at) yahoo(dot)com>
To: "World music from a Jewish slant" <jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org>
Sent: Thursday, January 15, 2004 10:30 PM
Subject: RE:Vibraphone/xylophone/marimba in Klezmer music


> Sorry for the delayed posting ...
>
> The strawFidl is the precursor to the modern xylophone. It was basically a
> bunch of xylophone bars, less the resonators and suspension sitting on a
bed of
> straw. Therefore, the sound was probably pretty muffled. Most probably
would
> not have been marimba, they weren't that popular at the time. And the
stuff
> that was popular was vaudeville and marimba orchestra. (as a cool aside,
check
> out these pics from the 1933 worlds fair marimba orchestra
> http://www.usma.edu/band/archives/pfpg1.htm)
>
> It would make sense that tsimbl players would have moved over to
xylophone.
> They were cheap and easy to get ahold of -- relatively. Additionally,
several
> countries have xylophones set up to play certain modes and scales like the
> German xylophone, where the bars are set up in sort of a trapezoid. This
is in
> contrast to the piano-like chromatic layout we use now. Probably wouldn't
be
> too hard to make the switch.
>
> Interestingly, I'm currently going the opposite direction of my
predecessors.
> After playing classical persussion and drumset for a while, I got into
playing
> klezmer xylophone. Some stuff actually works pretty nicely -- especially
fast
> stuff like quick accordian tunes and not surprisingly some tsimbl music.
But
> now Im going backwards and learning tsibml ...
>
> Funny how these things work out.
>
> -jonathan
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> --- Vladimir Liberman <vovka0 (at) gis(dot)net> wrote:
> > I Wonder---
> >
> > Maybe these instruments are an homage to the famous 19th century
Gusikov's
> > strawFidl (bottles wrapped in straw) that Felix Mendelsohn heard on his
> > travels to Russia and became so enamored of.. I wonder what the
strawfidl
> > sounded like..
> > Vlad Liberman
> >
> >
>
>
> =====
> Jonathan Simon
> Home - 732.777.0377
> Work - 201.671.1175
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>
>
>


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