Serpent (instrument) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

A serpent is a bass wind instrument

Wind instrument

A wind instrument is a musical instrument that contains some type of resonator , in which a column of air is set into vibration by the player blowing into a mouthpiece set at the end of the resonator. The pitch of the vibration is determined by the length of the tube and by manual modifications of...

, descended from the cornett

Cornett

The cornett, cornetto or zink is an early wind instrument, dating from the Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque periods. It was used in what are now called alta capellas or wind ensembles. It is not to be confused with the trumpet-like instrument cornet.-Construction:There are three basic types of...

, and a distant ancestor of the tuba

Tuba

The tuba is the largest and lowest-pitched brass instrument. Sound is produced by vibrating or "buzzing" the lips into a large cupped mouthpiece. It is one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra, first appearing in the mid-19th century, when it largely replaced the...

, with a mouthpiece

Mouthpiece (brass)

On brass instruments the mouthpiece is the part of the instrument which is placed upon the player's lips. The purpose of the mouthpiece is a resonator, which passes vibration from the lips to the column of air contained within the instrument, giving rise to the standing wave pattern of vibration in...

like a brass instrument

Brass instrument

A brass instrument is a musical instrument whose sound is produced by sympathetic vibration of air in a tubular resonator in sympathy with the vibration of the player's lips...

but side holes like a woodwind

Woodwind instrument

A woodwind instrument is a musical instrument which produces sound when the player blows air against a sharp edge or through a reed, causing the air within its resonator to vibrate...

. It is usually a long cone bent into a snakelike shape, hence the name. The serpent is closely related to the cornett

Cornett

, although it is not part of the cornett family, due to the absence of a thumb hole. It is generally made out of wood

Wood

Wood is a hard, fibrous tissue found in many trees. It has been used for hundreds of thousands of years for both fuel and as a construction material. It is an organic material, a natural composite of cellulose fibers embedded in a matrix of lignin which resists compression...

, with walnut

Walnut

Juglans is a plant genus of the family Juglandaceae, the seeds of which are known as walnuts. They are deciduous trees, 10–40 meters tall , with pinnate leaves 200–900 millimetres long , with 5–25 leaflets; the shoots have chambered pith, a character shared with the wingnuts , but not the hickories...

being a particularly popular choice. The outside is covered with dark brown or black leather. Despite wooden construction and the fact that it has fingerholes rather than valves, it is usually classed as a brass, with the Hornbostel-Sachs

Hornbostel-Sachs

Hornbostel–Sachs is a system of musical instrument classification devised by Erich Moritz von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs, and first published in the Zeitschrift für Ethnologie in 1914. An English translation was published in the Galpin Society Journal in 1961...

scheme of musical instrument classification

Musical instrument classification

At various times, and in various cultures, various schemes of musical instrument classification have been used.The most commonly used system in use in the west today divides instruments into string instruments, wind instruments and percussion instruments...

placing it alongside trumpet

Trumpet

The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...

s.

The serpent's range varies according to the instrument and the player, but typically covers one from two octave

Octave

In music, an octave is the interval between one musical pitch and another with half or double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been referred to as the "basic miracle of music", the use of which is "common in most musical systems"...

s below middle C

Middle C

C or Do is the first note of the fixed-Do solfège scale. Its enharmonic is B.-Middle C:Middle C is designated C4 in scientific pitch notation because of the note's position as the fourth C key on a standard 88-key piano keyboard...

to at least half an octave above middle C.

Characteristics

The serpent usually has six holes, which are ordered in two groups of three. On early models, the fingerholes were keyless, like those of a recorder

Recorder

The recorder is a woodwind musical instrument of the family known as fipple flutes or internal duct flutes—whistle-like instruments which include the tin whistle. The recorder is end-blown and the mouth of the instrument is constricted by a wooden plug, known as a block or fipple...

. However, later models added keys as on a clarinet

Clarinet

The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...

, although they were for additional holes (out of reach of the fingers), while the original holes remained unkeyed, and are to be covered or uncovered directly by the fingers of the player.

While it does not have the kind of rigidly defined fingering system that other wind instruments enjoy, the serpent requires an extraordinary amount of effort from the player, who must select the desired pitch with his or her lips, usually overriding the tone the instrument prefers to sound with any particular fingering. The serpent player also has a unique right-hand finger position, in that the index finger may be further down the tube towards the bell than the other fingers of that hand. In this respect the fingering of the right hand is reversed to that found in all other keyed wind instruments, where the keys and holes controlled by the index fingers are further up towards the mouthpiece than the other fingers. This is because the serpent was originally held vertically, with both of the player's hands oriented palm-down; in this position the right hand fingerings are not reversed in the manner described above. Later, players began to hold the instrument horizontally, necessitating a reversal of the right hand to palm-up, with the fingerings changing accordingly and left.

History

The instrument is claimed to have been invented by Canon Edmé Guillaume in 1590 in Auxerre

Auxerre

Auxerre is a commune in the Bourgogne region in north-central France, between Paris and Dijon. It is the capital of the Yonne department.Auxerre's population today is about 45,000...

, France, and was first used to strengthen the sound of choir

Choir

A choir, chorale or chorus is a musical ensemble of singers. Choral music, in turn, is the music written specifically for such an ensemble to perform.A body of singers who perform together as a group is called a choir or chorus...

s in plainchant. This date for the invention of the serpent did not appear until 1743, in Jean Lebœuf's "Mémoires Concernant l’Histoire Ecclésiastique et Civile d’Auxerre." Herbert Heyde asserts the serpent evolved from a type of bass cornetto and was invented in Italy in the 16th century. Around the middle of the 18th century, it began to be used in military band

Military band

A military band originally was a group of personnel that performs musical duties for military functions, usually for the armed forces. A typical military band consists mostly of wind and percussion instruments. The conductor of a band commonly bears the title of Bandmaster or Director of Music...

s and orchestras, but was replaced in the 19th century by a fully keyed brass instrument, the ophicleide

Ophicleide

The ophicleide is a family of conical bore, brass keyed-bugles. It has a similar shape to the sudrophone.- History :The ophicleide was invented in 1817 and patented in 1821 by French instrument maker Jean Hilaire Asté as an extension to the keyed bugle or Royal Kent bugle family...

, and later on by valved bass brass instruments such as the euphonium

Euphonium

The euphonium is a conical-bore, tenor-voiced brass instrument. It derives its name from the Greek word euphonos, meaning "well-sounding" or "sweet-voiced"...

and tuba

Tuba

. After that the Serpent dropped off in popularity for a period of time.

Bernard Herrmann

Bernard Herrmann

Bernard Herrmann was an American composer noted for his work in motion pictures.An Academy Award-winner , Herrmann is particularly known for his collaborations with director Alfred Hitchcock, most famously Psycho, North by Northwest, The Man Who Knew Too Much, and Vertigo...

used a serpent in the scores of White Witch Doctor
White Witch Doctor (film)
White Witch Doctor is a 1953 adventure film made by 20th Century Fox. It was directed by Henry Hathaway and produced by Otto Lang from a screenplay by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts, based on the 1950 novel by Louise A. Stinetorf...

and Journey to the Center of the Earth
Journey to the Center of the Earth (1959 film)
Journey to the Center of the Earth is a 1959 adventure film adapted by Charles Brackett from the novel by Jules Verne. It stars Pat Boone, James Mason, Arlene Dahl, Peter Ronson, Diane Baker, Thayer David and Alan Napier...

(1959).

In the 1970s instrument-maker Christopher Monk began playing and later making Serpents, and in 1976 he founded the London Serpent Trio. Since then, the instrument has been undergoing a revival of sorts. In 1987 the first concerto for the instrument was written by Simon Proctor

Simon Proctor

Simon Proctor is a British composer, pianist, and flautist, known for his works for unusual instruments.His best known work, the Concerto for Serpent and Orchestra, was written in 1987 when the composer was attached to the University of South Carolina...

. The Serpent Concerto was first performed on October 21, 1989 at the First International Serpent Festival (celebrating the 399th anniversary of the serpent) with Serpent soloist Alan Lumsden. Since that time, the Serpent Concerto has been performed in public on many occasions, most notably by Douglas Yeo

Douglas Yeo

Douglas Yeo is bass trombonist in the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where he holds the John Moors Cabot Bass Trombone Chair...

of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Boston Pops Orchestra, who played the solo part with the Boston Pops under the direction of John Williams. The concerto appears on a commercial CD recording "Le Monde du Serpent" (The World of the Serpent), on the Berlioz Historic Brass label, BHB 101, with the Berlioz Historical Brass, Gloria Dei Cantores choir, members of the Boston Symphony Orchestra et al. In 2008, Douglas Yeo premiered another serpent concerto, "Old Dances in New Shoes" by Washington D.C. based composer Gordon Bowie, with the Boston Classical Orchestra conducted by Steven Lipsitt.

Variations

There are two main types of serpent: curved (serpentine, or double-S, shaped) and straight/upright (the tube is mostly straight, but is folded back on itself in the middle, much like a bassoon

Bassoon

The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family that typically plays music written in the bass and tenor registers, and occasionally higher. Appearing in its modern form in the 19th century, the bassoon figures prominently in orchestral, concert band and chamber music literature...

). Within the curved style, there are two variations; Church (also called French) and Military (also called English). The Church serpent is the original type, popularized in France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, and is distinguished by gentle, sweeping curves and little (if any) metal reinforcements. The Military serpent was primarily made in England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

, and its characteristics include having tighter bends and a slightly more compact overall size as a result, with lots of metal bands and stays between the tubing. Furthermore, there are several different sizes besides the common "church" Serpent, including Contrabass

Contrabass

Contrabass refers to a musical instrument of very low pitch; generally those pitched one octave below instruments of the bass register...

("anaconda"), Tenor

Tenor

The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...

("serpent") and Soprano

Soprano

A soprano is a voice type with a vocal range from approximately middle C to "high A" in choral music, or to "soprano C" or higher in operatic music. In four-part chorale style harmony, the soprano takes the highest part, which usually encompasses the melody...

("worm"). Only the original bass size, and possibly the tenor, were made during the serpent's heyday. The soprano is a fanciful modern variant, and the contrabass is based on a single known original made after the serpent was already fading in popularity.

From its beginning as an instrument held vertically between one's knees with both palms facing down, Hermenge (in his serpent method - Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, 1817) suggested a horizontal playing position that rested in the right hand palm faced upward. This position was adopted by English military serpents and the instrument was made of a more robust construction (owing to marching or riding on horseback) with thicker walls of the wood and metal stays between the "S" bends of the serpent. The "English bass horn" was a variant on the "cimbasso" (= corno di basso), a form of upright serpent of metal consisting of a tube folded back on itself (rather like the modern bassoon

Bassoon

). Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn

Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...

scored for the English bass horn in the first edition of his "Midsummer Night's Dream" although the ophicleide

Ophicleide

was substitituted with his consent after the English bass horn fell rapidly from favor. Coeffet (Paris, active 1810-1845) invented the "ophimonocleide," an upright serpent with six holes and a single key (ophi = serpent, mono = one, kleis = key/covering). Upright serpents called the "basson Russe " (often referred to as the "Russian bassoon") - neither Russian nor a form of bassoon - often had a zoomorphic head like the buccin

Buccin

The buccin is a visually distinctive trombone popularized in military bands in France between 1810–1845 which subsequently faded into obscurity....

. The "serpent Forveille'" featured a small receptacle in the bocal to collect condensation that results from the warm breath of the player. Whereas other upright serpents usually had metal bells and either a metal or wooden body, the Serpent Forveille was half wood on the part from the middle up to the bell, and metal from the middle to the mouthpiece. Gradually keys were added to serpents (the most appear to have been 14, on instruments made by Thomas Key (London, c. 1830) on display at the Museum of Welsh Life in Cardiff, Wales (another specimen is owned but not displayed by the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...

in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

). The extraordinary contrabass serpent (in nominal CC) made by the Wood brothers in Huddersfield, England, c. 1840) has all of its holes covered by keys but, owing to the varying sizes of the holes and "chimneys" extending from each hole which are in turn covered by flat keys, is really more of a wooden contrabass ophicleide

Ophicleide

in serpentine shape.

The ophicleide

Ophicleide

(again, ophis = serpent, kleis = key/covering, therefore "keyed serpent",) was patented in France by Halary in 1821.

External links

The Serpent Website - an excellent reference for everything Serpent-related. Complete and detailed.
Complete Program Notes for "Le Monde du Serpent" - the story of Douglas Yeo's discovery of the Serpent and the recording of his 2003 solo Serpent CD.
Christopher Monk Instruments - Serpents and many other historical brass instruments are made here.
Contrabass Serpent - a page devoted to the c. 1840 Contrabass Serpent in the Edinburgh University Collection of Historic Musical Instruments.
The London Serpent Trio
serpent.instrument - Serpent french website by Volny Hostiou - : research and informations about church serpent

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.

Characteristics

History

Variations

See also

External links