Definite Pitch
Instruments :

Indefinite Pitch Instruments :

Alto

An instrument with a range just below the highest range reached by that family of instruments. It is between the soprano and tenor parts.

Aperture

An opening, hole

Bass

The lowest-pitched member of a family of instruments. Bass also denotes the lowest part in a musical composition.

Bell

The cup-shape or flared opening or a wind or brass instrument.

Bore

The diameter or shape of the tube

Bow

The bow is a narrow, slightly incurved stick of Pernambuco about 30 in long, with a band of horsehair stretched from end to end of the bowstick. The development of the modern bow began around 1700. An man named Corelli made it short and inelastic. Fifty years later Tortini made a bow longer and more flexible. A compromise between the two styles was made, creating the Tourte bow in the 19th century. It is an inward curving stick designed for good balance and is still used today.

Chamber Music

Music for a small ensemble.

Clarion

A medieval trumpet with clear shrill tones

Damper

A device for muting the sound of a certain instrument

Diatonic

The notes indigenous to a key in a major or minor scale

Double reed

Two thin pieces of cane bound together at their thicker ends.

Ebonite

A hard rubber, especially when black.

Harmony

The combination of simultaneous musical notes in a chord.

Headjoint

The piece of the flute where the mouthpiece is located.

Hotteterre

A family of French musicians and instrument makers.

Intonation

A manner of producing tones with regard to accurate pitch

Kettledrums

Single-headed drums with bowl-shaped shells

Ligature

The adjustable band that holds the reed against the mouthpiece.

Lute

A plucked string instrument with a half pear-shaped body. It has a fretboard and pegbox set at an angle. It has had six strings since the 17th century, after thousands of years of development.

Lyre

An ancient Greek instrument with a four-sided frame. This frame encompasses strings attached from a soundbox to a cross bar. It is played like a harp.

Melody

A sweet or agreeable succession or arrangement of musical tones

Neolithic Period

The part of the Stone Age beginning around 6000 B.C. It is also called the New Stone Age

Node

A nonvibrating point

Octave

The interval between the first and eighth notes of a diatonic scale

Orchestral Music

Music written for a large group of instruments. These usually include strings, brass, percussion and woodwinds.

Pitch

The highness or lowness of a note, as determined by its frequency or rapidity of the vibrations producing it.

Range

The notes, from lowest to highest, that an instrument may be capable of producing.

Reed

A vibrating strip of metal, cane, wood or plastic. It produces a tone when activated by air.

Register

A specific area of the range of an instrument.

Resonator

Any material used to amplify the vibrations so that they can be heard at a distance

Scale

A progression of notes in a specific order.

Snares

Wire-bound gut strings

Staccato

Short, separated notes. It also means detached.

String

On early violins the strings were of pure gut. Today they may be of gut, gut wound with aluminum or silver, steel, or perlon.

Tenor

Instruments in the tenor range. It is between the alto and baritone parts. The term received its name from the Latin tenere meaning "to hold". It was named this because in medieval music this part held the basic melodic line.

Timbre

Tone color or quality

Tone

Sound that has a definite pitch. Any given tone is characterized by length, loudness, timbre and a characteristic pattern of onset and decay.

Transverse flute

The modern flute, held horizontally and blown into from the side.

Treble

The highest instrument part.

Viol

A bowed stringed instrument chiefly of the 16th and 17th centuries made in treble, alto, tenor, and bass sizes. It is distinguished from members of the violin family especially in having a deep body, a flat back, sloping shoulders, a fretted fingerboard, and a low-arched bridge