![]() The Japanese shakuhachi is an end-blown flute, consisting of a wide bamboo tube with a notch at the top, four front finger holes, and one rear thumbhole. ![]() ![]() The player blows against either the sharp rim at the upper, open end of the tube (end-blown) or the rim of a hole in the side of the tube (side-blown). In true flutes, a ribbon-shaped column of air is produced between the player’s lips and directed against the edge of an aperture. Like all aerophones, flutes may be simple or complex, depending on their construction, the transverse flute being simple and panpipes, organs, and other multiple-tube instruments being more complex. Flutes are divided into so-called true flutes and whistle flutes (also called duct flutes, fipple flutes, block flutes, or recorders). In edge instruments (or flutes), an airstream directed against a sharp edge sets an adjoining air column within a tube into regular pulsations, producing sound. The resulting pitch is determined by the thickness and length of the vibrating reed. They contain free reeds, which vibrate above or through a slot, setting the air into pulsations. The mouth organ, the accordion, the reed organ, and the reed stops of the pipe organ are all considered free aerophones as well. A spatulate stone, bone, or board, sometimes carved in the shape of a fish or other object, is tied through a small hole to a string, which in turn is attached to a stick when the instrument is whirled around, it produces a sound by its disturbance of the air. Free aerophones, which include a variety of folk instruments as well as such technologically sophisticated devices as reed stops in organs ( see also keyboard instrument the organ), are distinguished from the other categories because the vibrating air is not contained by a tube. The wind instruments subdivide into edge instruments, reedpipes, and trumpet-type instruments according to their manner of tone production. The Sachs-Hornbostel system further classifies aerophones as free aerophones or as wind instruments proper. In this system, all wind instruments-that is, all instruments in which air itself is the primary vibrating medium for the production of sound-are called aerophones, whether or not the air is enclosed in a tube. It is based on the acoustical principles of an instrument’s sound, regardless of its stylistic or cultural context. ![]() The standard method of instrument classification was introduced in 1914 by Curt Sachs and Erich von Hornbostel. The fact that some modern woodwinds, such as flutes and saxophones, are made of metal whereas several ancestors of present-day brasses, such as the cornett and the serpent, were typically made of wood illustrates the unsuitability of a classification according to material. The conventional division of the symphony orchestra into sections has simplified the grouping of wind instruments into woodwinds and brasses, but this is an inaccurate classification that generally does not apply outside Western culture. A system of classification of these instruments must reflect and categorize the relationships and the differences between the many varieties. Wind instruments exhibit great diversity in structure and sonority and have been prominent in the music of all cultures since prehistoric times. Wind instrument, any musical instrument that uses air as the primary vibrating medium for the production of sound.
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