The guitar
- Yellow Shirts
- Dec 11, 2022
- 2 min read
Updated: Jan 8, 2023
The guitar is a plucked string instrument played with the fingers or with a plectrum (a small accessory held between the thumb and the index finger, also called a pick).
The guitar can be acoustic or electric. The difference lies in the method of amplification of the sound: the sound of the acoustic guitar is mechanically amplified by the resonance box whereas the sound of the electric guitar is electronically amplified, thanks to microphones and an amplifier.
Description
The guitar is composed of three main parts: the headstock, the neck, the resonance box, and the soundboard.
History of the guitar
The most distant ancestor of the guitar seems to be the musical bow at least 15,000 years ago! With time, the musical bow was enriched with additional strings. The bowed harp of Sumer and Egypt appeared around 3000 BC is based on this principle but with the difference that a resonance box will be added to it. Around 2000 B.C., a neck appeared on the instruments, allowing the pitch of the sounds to be modified. From this capital modification a large family of instruments was born throughout the world.
The Romans through trade around the Mediterranean will allow to make their instruments known instruments such as the cithara and the pandura. In the 8th century, the invasion of the Moors by Spain will allow to introduce the oud, the rebab, and the quitara. All Europe will be fascinated by these instruments with a very particular sound. It is in the 16th century that we will find instruments with 5 choruses (double strings) tuned like the guitar today. During the second half of the 18th century, guitar playing became increasingly popular. The addition of a sixth choir, the switch to six single strings, the replacement of gut frets by ivory, ebony, and then metal frets, led to the evolution of the guitar, frets by frets of ivory, ebony, and then metal, made the guitar evolve towards a sound more and more similar to that of the the classical guitar we know today.
Type of guitars in Romania
The guitar in Romanian folklore plays an accompanying role and traditional instrumentalists use the three-string guitar to accompany the melodic line of the violin. The same type of duet is also used in the north of Romania, in the ethnographic region of Maramures, where the guitar has fewer strings, is held vertically and is called "zongora".
The Kobza or cobza is a popular instrument in Moldavia and Romania, used in folk music. It is a very old instrument, belonging to the lute family. The most famous musicians in Moldova and Romania use it. The cobza could have arrived in Romania through the gypsies. In the paintings of the monasteries of the 16th century the cobza is often present.
- Paul
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