Fiddle: Barbados musical intrument
A fiddle can be any cowed string musical instrument such as the violin. It is also an informal term for the instrument used by most player...
http://worldhitz4u.blogspot.com/2013/12/fiddle-barbados-musical-intrument.html
A fiddle can be any cowed
string musical instrument such as the violin. It is also an informal term for
the instrument used by most players in all genres. Fiddling means various
styles of music.
Common difference between
the violin and the fiddle reflect the distinction in the instruments used in
the playing of the folk and classical music. Meanwhile, it is still common for
classically trained violinist to play the folk music and in the modern day the
fiddle players are classically trained.
The medieval fiddle was
discovered in the 10th century in Europe deriving from the Byzantine
lira which is a bowed instrument of the Byzantine Empire and the ancestor of
most European Bowed musical instruments. The bowed lira had its first reference
documented in the 9th century by the Persian geographer ‘Ibn
Khurradadhbih’ in his lexicographical discussion of musical instruments where
he cited the lira as a representative instrument of the Byzantines and
equivalent to the rabab that is used in the Islamic Empires. Lira extended
widely westward to Europe. In the 11th and the 12th
centuries, European writers use the term fiddle and lira alternatively when
referring to bowed instruments. And over the centuries, Europe has continued to
have two clearly different types of fiddles; one squared-shape and held in the
arms known as the “lira da braccio” and the other with sloping shoulders and
held between the knees was known as the “lira da gamba.”
source of picture: www.barbadospropertylist.com
The history of fiddle is
still unknown, the Germanic fiddle assumingly came from the same early romance
word as the violin or it may be natively Germanic. A native Germanic fiddle’s
ancestor could even be the ancestor of the early romance form of the violin.
Though historically, the fiddle is the descendant of the today’s violin, and
like the violin, it has four strings but they came in so many sizes and shapes.
Another musical instrument which contributed to the development of the fiddle
is the viols which of the same family with the violin and are held between the
legs and played vertically and have four fretted fingerboard.
The Hungarian, Slovenian
and the Romanian fiddle players are always accompanied by a three-stringed
variant of the viola which is known as the kontra and by the double bass with
the cimbalom and the clarinet being less standard yet still common additions to
a band. Also in Hungary, a three-stringed viola that differs slightly with a
flat bridge that is called the kontra or háromhúros brácsa forms part of a
traditional rhythm section part in Hungarian folk music. The flat bridge permits
for three-string chords to be played. A three-stringed-double-bass variant is
also in use.