Existing comment:
Glass armonica, 1760-1780
According to family tradition, this armonica was owned by Mme Brillon de Jouy, a friend and neighbor of Benjamin Franklin in Passy, France.
"The advantages of this instrument are, that its tones are incomparably sweet beyond those of any other; that they may be swelled and softened at pleasure by stronger and weaker pressures of the finger, and continued to any length; and that the instrument, being once well tunes, never again wants tuning."
-- Letter from Benjamin Franklin to Giambatista Beccaria, 1762
A Love of Music:
Franklin played the violin, harp, and guitar, wrote and sang songs with friends, and also invented "one of the most celebrated instruments of the 18th century" -- the glass armonica. The concept is based on the sound produced by running a wet finger around the rim of a glass; Franklin's innovation was to mount a range of glass bowls on a rod, turned by a foot pedal or a hand wheel.
Friends and acquaintances were entertained with the new instrument, which won praise for its "angelic strains." By Franklin's death in 1790, about 5,000 glass armonicas had been made in Europe. Mozard and Beethoven were inspired to compose works for the instrument, although Franklin preferred simple Scottish airs. |