The heart of the modern symphony is the string section. The art and technology of the strings was developed more than two centuries before that of the other instrument types. Due to the way that stringed instruments create sound and to the beneficial effect of natural raw materials used in their construction, there are less tonal compromises in that instrument group than in the others. Thus, the strings represent the best of craft production hardly affected by societal and economic effects of the Industrial Revolution.

 

The beginnings of the Industrial Revolution had a major impact on instrumental technology other than that of the strings. In fact, the Industrial Revolution also had much to do with the overall development of the modern symphony orchestra. Much was written in the nineteenth century about the need to have a music that matched the times--big, bold, and robust.

 

The orchestra as a whole

 

In Mannheim, Germany in 1745, Johann Wenzel Stamitz "helped develop the technique of orchestral performance and finally establish[ed] the organization of the orchestra along a more less permanent design." In the next hundred years--largely through technical innovations by woodwind and brass instrument makers and inclusion of new instruments by major composers--the modern orchestra came about.

     

From this point on [mid-eighteenth century] the evolution of the orchestra consisted in the continual introduction of new instruments, and the extension of technique in the performance of all instruments; also in the continual experimentation with tone coloration, dynamics, sonorities, and expressive effects. Beethoven brought new importance to the brass, timpani, and double bass while introducing into his instrumentation such less familiar instruments as the trombone, contrabassoon, and several percussion. Berlioz introduced further refinements and innovations in the treatment of various orchestral choirs and took advantage of the important improvements made in the wind instruments during the first half of the 19th century, such as the introduction of valves and pistons in horns and trumpets. . .  

     

By the end of the 19th century--with Brahms, Mahler, and Franck among other symphonists--the organization of the modern symphony orchestra became fully established. Henceforth composers might occasionally use novel or rare or exotic instruments for special effects, but the basic physiognomy of the orchestra was to remain unchanged.

 

The strings

 

The violin and its companions, the viola, cello, and bass--were perfected long before the concept of the symphony orchestra was developed. It is not in any way a misstatement of history to observe that the orchestra was built around the strings--which were already capable of playing in any and all keys and which had a long history of ensemble performance with the voice, with keyboard instruments, and with each other.

 

 

The strings--most particularly the violin--set the standard for the other instruments. As is common knowledge in the auction houses of the world, the violin was perfected in and around Cremona Italy in the sixteenth century. Andrea Amati built the first modern violin in around 1550 based on the popular viola da gamba--the 'leg' viola. Amati was a great teacher--passing on his knowledge to his two sons and grandson--along with Ruggieri, Guarneri, and Stradiveri.

 

 

Violin-making more than overcame the pressures of the Industrial Revolution. It left modernists in their tracks--unable to duplicate the work of the master violin makers of Italy. Made of approximately seventy pieces, the violin and its sound--created from a fortuitous combination of wood, varnish, acoustics, and vibration--was well-established in the minds of subsequent instrumental theorists and craftsmen. Rather than suffering from an agonizing process of compromise and trial prior to being accepted into the symphony overall, the violin's beauty and grace served as the standard. If the other instruments couldn't match the violin family, at least they couldn't be found to detract from their elegance.

 

The woodwinds

 

The instruments that achieved solid membership in the symphony woodwind section are descended from a wide array of musical devices and objects--each with an interesting and long history. All of the woodwind instruments are based on two related principles--a vibrating air column and variations in the length of that air column. Vibrations are created by air pressure against either reeds (as in clarinets, oboes, and bassoons) or a sharp edge (as in the flute).

 

Longer air columns create lower notes. The length of the air column in woodwind instruments is determined by holes cut into the instruments' bodies at various positions. The structure of these notes is consistent with the physics of sound, of course--a hole halfway up the length of the instrument's main tube will be twice as high (an octave higher) than results from the full length of the instrument.

 

 

The major problem with the woodwinds in attempts to bring them into the orchestra with full functionality was found in human anatomy. How could a human with ten fingers play an instrument that required several octaves of half-tone notes--as many as forty-eight or more to match the strings? As with the brass, the ability to 'overblow' an octave provided part of the solution, but fingers could still be found to stretch only so far--limiting not only the notes that realistically could be played, but the technical facility with which the notes themselves could be rendered.

 

Theobald Boehm, a nineteenth century 'renaissance man' who also over saw restructuring of Bavarian steel industry in the period from 1833 to 1842, tackled this problem in the 1830s. Boehm, a flautist, composer, goldsmith and ironmaster, designed a series of instruments with correct acoustic placement of tone holes while devising a series of mechanical keys to open and close the holes from comfortable and convenient hand positions. This system was adapted to the clarinet, the oboe, English horn, and bassoon. His crowning achievement in this regard in 1847 was a metal flute with 15 holes and 27 levers and keys.

 

Boehm's invention freed the woodwinds to literally fly over the scales and the notes in a manner not unlike that of the violins. This development allowed the great symphonic composers to consider the woodwinds to match the strings in this way--providing the orchestra with many additional sounds and tonal combinations. By all accounts--to the credit of woodwind instrumentalists of that day--they immediately grasped the positive implications of Boehm's new technology for the benefit of the orchestra overall. As we will discuss presently, symphonic players of brass instruments did not similarly respond to promising new developments.

 

 

The flute as an instrument dates to mankind's beginnings. Traditionally, flutes have either been 'end-blown'--as in the common recorder, or 'side-blown'--as in the modern orchestral transverse flute. Flutes in the early sixteenth century were typically made of one-piece wood blocks, in various sizes, typically with six finger holes. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries there were improvements in the structure and composition of flutes, but the instrument did not achieve maturity--virtually the same as the modern instrument--through the aforementioned efforts of Theobald Boehm. Accompanying the flute in the symphony are the octave higher piccolo and the alto flute, sounding four notes (a perfect fourth) lower than the notes are written. In the eighteenth century, the alto flute was referred to as the flute d'amour.

 

 

The oboe--with its siblings the English horn and the bassoon--was born in the reeds by the river. It first appeared in written musical scores in the fifteenth century under the name hautbois. The oboe unique, mysterious sound comes from a double reed, the construction and maintenance of which is the key to the success of the oboist. There was considerable development of the oboe in France in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, but the instrument did not mature until addition of Boehm-style keys. Principal development of the oboe occurred in Paris in the nineteenth century by Henri Brod and Guillaume Triebert, who adjusted the size and position of the note holes, the width of the reed, and the proportions of the bore.

 

The oboe is generally wooden, made of grenadilla, rosewood, and cocus wood. The English horn (which is curiously neither English nor a 'horn') is an alto version of the oboe, with a curved crook and a globular bell. Two versions of the oboe that are occasionally used in the symphony are the oboe d'amore--between the oboe and the English horn--and the Heckelphone, a bass version of the oboe that was invented in 1904.

 

The bassoon--though like the oboe, a double reed instrument--has a very different history than that of the oboe. The ancestor to the bassoon was a fifteenth century bass double reed instrument named the Curtal--which was carved into a U-shaped tube from a single block of wood. By making adjustments in the structure in the seventeenth century, the French were able to overcome limitations of the single wood block design. In the early nineteenth century, the instrument benefited from a complete makeover by both the French (through the Buffet family) and the Germans (Wilhelm Heckl)--incorporating Boehm's combinations of levers and keys. Both versions survive today--a source of national pride as to which is superior.

 

 

The clarinet was actually the invention of one man--a unique condition among all instruments--with the possible exception of some percussion instruments. Johann Christoph Denner (1655-1707) is credited with this feat in 1690 by adding two keys to an instrument called the chalumeau--increasing the instrument's range by over two octaves. The clarinet makes use of a single reed bound to a mouthpiece to form its tone.

 

The clarinet could not play in all keys until the addition of Boehm's technology in the mid-nineteenth century, but it was nonetheless used before that time. Mozart was the first to include the clarinet in symphonic work in the late eighteenth century--largely because of the skill of his friend Anton Stadler. Before Mozart, the clarinet was considered "weak and characterless" and had significant intonation problems. There were many clarinets of different keys designed throughout the years--but the B-flat clarinet was chosen as the instrument of choice in spite of the transposition problems they presented due to its superior tone. Individuals principally involved in the development of the clarinet in the early nineteenth century include Ivan Muller, Adolphe Sax in Germany, and Hyachinthe Klose of Paris, who adapted the Boehm system to the clarinet.

 

The clarinet is known to have superior capabilities for adjusting volume from soft to loud, etc. It is known as "the orchestra's most versatile woodwind instrument. . . and is as at home with brilliant, rapid passage work as it is with long expressive melodies. It blends well with other instruments." Complementing the B-flat soprano clarinet are the bass clarinet and the contrabass clarinet.

 

The brass

 

Descended from crumhorns, sackbuts, ophicleides, and cornopeans--brass instruments of necessity required many years of evolution before sharing center stage with the aristocratic strings. In fact--while the violin and its relatives can be considered children of a never-ending craft, trumpets and their brothers are clearly born of the Industrial Revolution. Their valve mechanisms are clearly reminiscent of the steam-generated lunch whistle of the nineteenth century factory, they are made of alloyed metals, and their very construction is based on the technology of the machine shop.

 

 

Through the history of development of brass instruments, their major distinguishing characteristic has been that their sound was created by means of air pressure on the performer's lips--rather than from a vibrating reed or other non-anatomic means, as in the case of the flute. Brass instruments have not always been made of brass--having been fashioned from various materials from wood, animal horns, seashells, etc. Cornettos--popular in the late middle ages, were wooden instruments with acoustical holes similar to the woodwind instruments of the period, but whose sound was generated by means of the lips--not reads or split air streams.

 

Such devices have been used in all societies for millennia--not only for the purpose of making 'art' music, but for military, community, and regal ends. They can be loud--and their sound has shown to carry for long distances in the open air. The sound of trumpets, bugles, horns, etc. have been used to signal the approach of great armies, of hunters, and of regal processions and royal missions. For such purposes, the rougher the sound, the brasher the tone, the more power was demonstrated and fear was generated.

 

 

For these reasons, the brass instruments were brought into music chambers slowly and with a measure of care. Nonetheless, by the late eighteenth century, both the natural trumpet and the natural horn enjoyed some success in the early symphonic works of the time. In the face of this, the real problem with brass instruments is based on the physics of sound and in compromises in the tone of the new mechanical instruments. While woodwind instruments using the Boehm system could depend on consistent tone and could quite naturally play in tune--compromises engineered into the brass instruments to allow them to play all the necessary notes and keys brought obvious distortions to both the tone and the pitch of the instruments.

 

Thus, in the early nineteenth century, when keys and valves were introduced into the brass instrument world, there was real resistance among the premier players to these new developments. For one thing, symphonic music was written to compensate for these limitations.

     

The trumpet and the horn were used in orchestras and bands in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, their musical capabilities being extended by hand-stopping (standard practice with the horn, but also used with some trumpets), and on the trumpet by using instruments with slides or keys. These techniques increased the number of notes available to players, but they were used in conjunction with crooks which were selected according to the key of the music being played. The orchestral horn player needed eight or nine crooks; the horn soloist, the bandsman horn player and the trumpeter fewer. If the music changed key, time had to be allowed for the musicians to change crook. Parts written for the horn and trumpet were closely related to the series of notes available on the natural instruments, unlike trombone parts.  

   

Thus, in the late eighteenth century and the early twentieth century, innovators brought out a steady string of innovations designed to solve the brass players' problems--not only that of changing crooks (which could, of course, be solved with an array of instruments capable of playing in various keys). Natural instruments simply couldn't carry a tune based on the standard music structure as had been worked out with keyboard instruments and would soon be solved with the woodwinds.

 

There was no clear technical answer to the problem of the brasses as had occurred with respect to the woodwinds and the innovations of Boehm; hence, there were many stillborn development attempts in the period. In 1788 Charles Claggett, an Irishman made an early valved device, followed by Heinrich Stolzel in Prussia in 1814, which was widely used in spite of its reported limitations. Double piston valves were introduced in Vienna by Christian Friedrich Sattler in 1921 that was later patented by Leopold Uhlmann in 1830--a version of which is in use in Vienna to this day.

 

Wilhelm Wieprecht developed a Berlin valve in 1833, but the eventual winning design was by Francois Perinet of Paris, who brought the current style of piston valve to the market in 1839. Rotary valves were found to be preferred on French horns and on most instruments east of the Rhine--having been patented by instrument maker Josef Riedl in Vienna in 1835. Additional valve types were introduced by at least a dozen more innovators, but most efforts in the past 150 years have been to improve on the Perinet model.

 

With such changes, brass players could join in with other musicians by playing melodies and thus contributing much more to the organization as a whole. In spite of this, it should be known that brass instrumentalists did not take readily to mechanization. For one thing, they did not like the insecurity of depending on mechanical devices. Purists among them missed the pure sound of the open horn. The more valves that were pressed, the more masked and 'ugly' (and out of tune) the sound became. This could be partially overcome with the lips, the breath, and in other ways, but the net effect was not as clear and fresh as was possible with the open instrument.

 

It was soon realized that valves, when mechanically capable of being operated rapidly, could be used not merely to change crook[s] simply and rapidly, but to play tunes and ensemble parts with facility; more evenly than by hand-stopping the French horn and more easily than by moving the slide on a trumpet or trombone. From the 1820s, valved horns and valved trumpets benefited from more efficient valve mechanisms and became popular in bands and orchestras. Although there was continued resistance from musicians who placed greater value on the sound quality of the natural instrument than on the facility of the valves, by the early years of the twentieth century valved instruments were universally used not only for the modern repertoire for which there were necessary but also for the old hand-horn and natural trumpet repertoires.  

   

Thus, tradition died hard--consuming more than a century for full conversion from the old to the new. As will be discussed, trombonists avoided the issue entirely by retaining their traditional slide mechanisms to conquer the chromatic hurdle. The fact that such a conversion required such an extended period would indicate that more than a generation of players held on to the old ways rather than take steps to fully integrate their activity with that of the rest of the orchestra.

 

In part, this reticence to adapt to change might be due to the issues--particularly the challenge to deal with naturally out of tune notes. Part of the failure to change could be accounted for due to the nature of the instrumentalists themselves. It is possible that brass players--brash and impetuous though they might be--are of a nature more curmudgeonly than woodwind instrumentalists, who were much less resistant to technologies that would allow them to play on par with the strings.

 

 

Trumpets brought with them a martial, regal air of their own because they had a heritage as the instrument of kings. Though the lead violinist is officially the concertmaster--the leader of the musicians--the trumpeters like to think that they are essentially 'leading the charge.' There is a wide collection of instruments that trumpeters must master to handle the full orchestral repertoire. The orchestral standard instrument is the C trumpet, but players make extensive use of the large Bb instrument as well as D trumpets, G and F instruments for Baroque use--as well as high-pitched Bb/A piccolo trumpets for high 'clarino' parts. Among other things, the orchestral trumpeter must be a master of transposition.

 

 

The French horn enjoyed early acceptance into polite musical society despite its hunting-horn beginnings. It gained entry into the parlors and royal sitting rooms prior to the advent of the symphony sufficient to be considered in many circles a member of the woodwind group of instruments. By adapting to rotary, rather than piston valves, the French horn is capable of a smoother transition from note to note than the trumpet--though not so much as the trombone. With its longer, cylindrical bore, the French horn is capable of a wider dynamic range and more subtle tonal changes than the other brass instruments.

 

Trombones enjoy a freedom of movement and a silken sound that conflicts with their blue collar reputation. Though they overcame the valve revolution by simply doing nothing, they do benefit from a clearer, more natural tone than is possible on the other brass instruments. Valve trombones do persist, but they are rare and almost extinct outside of jazz bands.

 

The tuba was invented for German military bands in the early nineteenth century (though the inventor is not known), the tuba is really a family of instruments of various keys and designs. Collectively, they provide the bass voice to the brass family.

 

Percussion

 

 

As demeaning as it might seem to the elite of concert pianists, the piano is in the same orchestral section as the bass drum--essentially due to a technical coincidence. They both involve hitting something to make a sound. In addition, there is a number of other keyboard instruments in the orchestra. These include glockenspiels (bells), marimba, vibraphones, xylophones, celests, etc. All of these instruments benefited from the compromised built into the chromatic keyboard as described above.

 

 

As to drums, there are timpani--which are tunable--and the rest, which are typically atonal. Thus, while timpani players must be aware of and adapt to the harmonic structure of what the rest of the orchestra is playing, the other drummers do not. One development assisting timpanists to change keys is the introduction of foot pedals--speeding up the task. Otherwise, timpanists were faced with similar challenges as the brass players who needed to quickly change crooks in their instruments when key changes were encountered.

 

Integration with the other instruments of the orchestra was not a major issue for percussion instruments--which were typically chosen to provide special effects. In fact, there is technically no limit to what might serve as a percussion instrument. Integration is more a matter of applied skill and taste--rather than in a need to coordinate all of the elements of pitch, key, melody, harmony, etc.