Hurdy-gurdy
A hurdy gurdy (or hurdy-gurdy) is a stringed musical instrument with several strings arranged so that they can be played simultaneously by a rotating wheel covered with rosin. It is essentially a mechanical violin. This method of producing sound is similar to string instruments such as the violin, but because the hurdy gurdy produces several notes together, with a melody accompanied by chords made by "drone strings", its sound is perhaps more comparable to that of bagpipes. For this reason, the hurdy gurdy is often accompanied by the bagpipes, particularly in French and contemporary Hungarian folk music.
History
The hurdy gurdy is thought to have originated in the northern part of the Iberian Peninsula some time prior to the eleventh century A.D., although some historians have tried to place its origins in north Africa among the Moors. The earliest form of the hurdy gurdy was the organistrum, a large instrument with a guitar-shaped body and a long neck in which the keys were set (covering one diatonic octave). The organistrum had a single melody string and two drone strings which ran over a common bridge and a relatively small wheel. Due to its size, the organistrum was played by two people, one of whom turned the crank while the other pulled the keys upward. Pulling keys upward is a cumbersome playing technique, and as a result only slow tunes could be played on the organistrum. The pitches on the organistrum were set according to Pythagorean temperament and the instrument was primarily used in monastic and church settings to accompany choral music. The earliest description of the organistrum is that of the abbot Odo of Cluny (died 942), who wrote a short description of the construction of the organistrum entitled Quomodo organistrum construatur (How the Organistrum Is Made). The first known visual depiction of the organistrum is from the twelfth-century Portica de la Gloria (Portal of Glory) on the cathedral at Santiago de Compostella, Galicia, Spain, which includes a carving of two musicians playing an organistrum.
Later on the organistrum was reduced in size to allow a single player to both turn the crank and manipulate the keys. The solo organistrum was known from Spain and France, but was largely replaced by the symphonia, a small box-shaped version of the hurdy-gurdy with three strings and a diatonic keyboard. At about the same time as the symphonia was developed, a new form of key pressed from beneath were developed. These keys were much more practical in faster music and easier to handle and eventually completely replaced keys pulled up from above. Medieval depictions of the symphonia show both types of keys.
During the Renaissance, the hurdy gurdy was a very popular instrument, along with the bagpipe, and a characteristic form with a short neck and a boxy body with a curved tail end developed. It was about this time that buzzing bridges first appear in depictions of the instrument. The buzzing bridge (commonly called the dog) is an asymmetrical bridge that rests under a drone string on the sound board. When the wheel is accelerated, one foot of the bridge lifts up from the soundboard and vibrates, creating a buzzing sound. The buzzing bridge is thought to have been borrowed from the tromba marina (monochord), a bowed string instrument.
During the late Renaissance, two characteristic shapes of hurdy gurdies developed. The first was guitar-shaped and the second had a rounded lute-type body made of staves. The lute body is especially characteristic of French instruments.
By the end of the 17th century changing musical tastes that demanded greater polyphonic capabilities than the hurdy gurdy could offer had pushed the instrument to the lowest social classes; as a result it acquired names like the German Bauernleier ‘peasant’s lyre’ and Bettlerleier ‘beggar’s lyre.’ During the 18th century, however, French Rococo tastes for rustic diversions brought the hurdy gurdy back to the attention of the upper classes, where it acquired tremendous popularity among the nobility, with famous composers writing works for the hurdy gurdy (the most famous of which is Vivaldi’s Il pastor fido). At this time the most common style of hurdy gurdy developed, the six-string vielle à roue. This instrument has two melody strings and four drones tuned such that by turning drones on or off, the instrument can be played in multiple keys (e.g., C and G or G and D).
During this time the hurdy gurdy also spread further east, where further variations developed in western Slavic countries, German-speaking areas and Hungary. Most of these were essentially extinct by the early twentieth century, but a few sorts have survived in the region to the present day, the best-known of which is the Hungarian tekerőlant. In Ukraine, a variety called the lira was widely used by blind street musicians, most of whom were purged by Stalin in the 1930s.
Buzzing bridge
Some types of hurdy gurdy, notably the French vielle à roue ('fiddle with a wheel') and the Hungarian tekerőlant (tekerő for short) have added a buzzing bridge, chien (French for dog) or recsegő (Hungarian for buzzer) on one drone string (modern makers have increased the number of buzzing bridges on French-style instruments to as many as four). This mechanism consists of a loose bridge under a drone string. The tail of this buzzing bridge is inserted into a narrow vertical slot (or held by a peg in Hungarian instruments) that holds the buzzing bridge in place (and also serves as a bridge for additional drone strings on some instruments). The free end of the dog (called the hammer) rests on the soundboard of the hurdy gurdy and is more or less free to vibrate. When the wheel is turned slowly the pressure on the string (called the trompette on French instruments) holds the bridge in place, sounding a drone. When the crank is accelerated, the hammer lifts up and vibrates against the soundboard, producing a characteristic rhythmic buzz that is used as an articulation or to provide percussive effect, especially in dance pieces.
In French-style instruments, the sensitivity of the buzzing bridge can be altered by turing a peg called a tirant in the tailpiece of the instrument that is connected by a wire or thread to the trompette. The tirant adjusts the lateral pressure on the trompette and thereby sets the sensitivity of the buzzing bridge to changes in wheel velocity. There are various stylistic techniques that are used as the player turns the crank handle, his/her hand giving the crank quick hits of the wrist and fingers, which speed up the wheel at different points in one revolution (or complete turn). These hits are under the control of player, and are not automatic, having to be "put in" with each complete turn of the wheel.
On the Hungarian tekerő the same control is achieved by using a wedge called the recsegőék (buzzer wedge) that pushes the drone string downward. In traditional tekerő playing, the buzzing bridge is controlled entirely by the wrist of the player and has a very different sound and rhythmic possibilities from those available on French instruments.
Strings and playing
The drone strings produce steady sounds at fixed pitches. The melody string(s) (French chanterelle(s), Hungarian dallamhúr(ok)) are stopped with tangents attached to keys that change the vibration length of the string, much as a guitarist uses his or her fingers on the fretboard of a guitar. In the earliest hurdy-gurdies these keys were arranged to provide a Pythagorean temperament, but in later instruments the tunings have varied widely, with equal temperament most common in order to allow for easier blending with other instrument. However, because the tangents can be adjusted to tune individual notes, it is possible to tune hurdy-gurdies to almost any temperament as needed. Many of the best tuning now provide 24 keys, for a playing range of two chromatic octaves.
In order to achieve proper intonation and sound quality, each string of a hurdy-gurdy must be wrapped with cotton or similar fibers. The cotton on melody strings tends to be quite light, while drone strings have heavier cotton. Improper cottoning results in a raspy tone, especially at higher pitches. In addition, individual strings (in particular the melody strings) often have to have their height above the wheel surface adjusted by having small pieces of paper placed between the strings and the bridge, a process called shimming. Shimming and cottoning are connected processes since either one can affect the geometry of the instrument’s strings.
Types of hurdy gurdies
The countries with an unbroken tradition of making and playing this instrument include Spain (zanfona), France (vielle à roue), Hungary (tekerőlant), and Ukraine (lira). Revivals have been underway for many years now, in Sweden, Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, Poland, Russia, Italy, and Portugal. Many folk music festivals in Europe feature music groups with hurdy-gurdy players, but the most famous annual festival is at Saint-Chartier, in the Indre département, in central France, during the week nearest July 14 (Bastille Day).
Origin of the name
The origin of the term hurdy-gurdy is unknown, and is most likely onomatopoetic in origin, after the repetitive warble in pitch that characterizes instruments with solid wooden wheels that have warped due to changes in humidity or after the sound of the buzzing-bridge. Some have suggested other origins for the term, including the following folk etymology:
hurdy = a person's backside + gurdy = a reel with a crank, used to reel in fishing nets on a boat. This pejorative name was applied to the French instrument in England, during the 18th century.
(There are a number of problems with this putative etymology. Among them are (1) hurdy is not known as an English term, and (2) the term for the crank is hurdy-gurdy not gurdy, and was first recorded in 1883, clearly based on the term for the instrument.)
In the 19th century the term hurdy-gurdy was also applied to a small, portable "barrel organ" (a cranked box instrument with a number of organ pipes, a bellows and a barrel with pins that rotated and programmed the tunes) that was frequently played by poor buskers (street musicians). Barrel organs require only the turning of the crank, and the music is played automatically by pinned barrels, perforated paper rolls, and more recently by computer chip modules.
This confusion over what the name hurdy-gurdy means is particular to English, although similar confusion over other terms for the instrument occur in German and Hungarian. The French call the barrel organ the Orgue de Barbarie (‘Barbary organ’), and the Germans Drehorgel (‘turned organ’), instead of Drehleier (‘turning lyre’).
It is evident that some of the names given to the instrument are misnomers: in addition to those just given, the Hungarian name tekerőlant means "turning lute", and the German name sometimes used, Bauernleier, means "peasant's lyre". These names apparently refer to the instrument's lute- or lyre-like shape, but there is otherwise no connection between the hurdy-gurdy and either the lute or the lyre family.
Another Hungarian name for the instrument is nyenyere, an onomatopoetic reference to the instrument's somewhat nasal sound.
External links
- The hurdy-gurdy mailing list is an active email list of players and enthusiasts.
- Sean Folsom's Vielle a Roue by Tixier a Jenzat is an explanation of the hurdy-gurdy in sound and photos.
- The Hurdy Gurdy Girls is an interesting historical note concerning a scandalous practice related to the hurdy-gurdy.
Recordings
- There is a hurdy gurdy on the Metallica album ReLoad, played by David Miles on the 11th track, Low Man's Lyric.
- There is hurdy gurdy and border pipes on the Earthly Delights album Pleasures for Four Seasons and Favourites for Four Settings, played by John Garden and located at Earthly Delights. Each tune is also supplied with sheet music for musicians to use.
- Hurdy gurdies are used in many of the recordings by the Swedish groups Garmarna and Hedningarna.
- In 1999, Stefan Brisland-Ferner of Garmarna and Hållbus Totte Mattsson of Hedningarna began collaborating on a musical project that would involve a novel use of hurdy gurdies, which would expand on the idea that the hurdy gurdy was the medieval equivalent of a synthesizer. In 2005, they released their first album under the name "Hurdy-Gurdy", titled "Prototyp." The album consists of twelve traditional and original songs, played entirely on two Swedish hurdy gurdies by Brisland-Ferner and Mattsson. Specialized recording and computer editing techniques were used to produce a number of unique musical effects.
- The Australian world/fusion group Umanee features hurdy gurdy in many of their songs.
- Nigel Eaton plays hurdy gurdy on "Unledded", the DVD of Jimmy Page and Robert Plant's 1990s band Page and Plant.
- The German folk-rock band Schandmaul uses a hurdy gurdy.
- The German folk-rock metal band In Extremo sometimes uses a hurdy gurdy in their songs.
- The avant-garde band Zaar has a hurdy gurdy player.
- The Irish musician Andy Irvine plays the hurdy gurdy on several tracks, most prominently on the tune Planxty Irvine.