My oldest and I were kicking around the concept of musical instruments this evening. They’re history and development and such.
We both seemed to agree that some sort of percussion - the secret’s to bang the rocks together, guys - was likely the first musical instrument. Perhaps we’re wrong but it feels right.
But what about the others? Is there a timeline of this? First wind? String? Brass? What? Do we know about the development of the variety of musical instruments?
How about this Neanderthal flute?
Three minutes. Impressive. Terminus est indeed.
It’s hard to get an accurate timeline since many instruments were made long before recorded history. Early musicians used to cut slits into logs to “tune” them to various pitch drums. An elephant skin drum was found that dates back about 30,000 years or so. Flutes and pipes date back to at least 40,000 years ago. Rattles have been found that are more than 10,000 years old. Bullroarer’s date back to at least about 20,000 years ago.
Wiki link for bullroarer, for those who aren’t familiar with what they are: Bullroarer - Wikipedia
String instruments date back to at least 3,000 years ago in Mesopotamia.
Horn instruments are named horn instruments because people used to make them out of, well, horns (kinda obvious when you think about it, isn’t it?). Metal “horn” instruments came later, and early versions were modeled after the animal horn instruments. Modern brass instruments evolved out of these.
Percussion instruments probably were the first instruments. Some of the earliest were probably just rocks that were chipped and shaped to alter their percussive sound properties.
I will be horridly pedantic and note the the human voice counts as an instrument. Indeed many regard it as the finest of all instruments.
It’s not as old as the Neanderthal flute (which I have only just learned about), but apparently there were one or more whistles with holes in them found at the Dolni Vestonice site in the modern-day Czech republic , dated to about 25,000 years ago
Woodpeckers hammer on wood to attract mates. I’m going to guess there were woodpeckers or something similar doing this before Homo Sapiens emerged. Wouldn’t this count?
Here is a seriously serious article on Neanderthal musical instruments from Discover magazine.
And if Francis will kindly make room for me in that bench, percussion includes clapping and banging your feet. No need for rocks. Moving to objects which are not part of the human body, some mediuma and large seashells make interesting, modulable sounds by blowing into them with no need for modifications: this makes them both an easy instrument to use and one which may not be recognized as such.
I wonder how early it was that humans discovered the “cupping your hands and blowing between the thumbs” thing? (Is there a name for that?)
So that’s how you use the three seashells!
One would assume that the next step after banging rocks together (easier on the hands than clapping) is to determine that blowing across a precise cavity produces a sound, and progress from there to whistles, or “when I plug the hole in the side, the sound changes”. You have to remember that in the Good Old Days, there would be occasions when people had plenty of time on their hands to play around with this stuff and not much else to do. (How do you think they figured out planets, or which days were equinox? No TV.)
I assume string instrument were a side effect of bow-and-arrow tech, when stretching a thin string taut became a habitual activity.
I do wonder, too, about didgeridoos? The Australian aborigines supposedly landed there about 45,000 to 65,000 years ago. When did they start blowing into hollow logs as a pastime?
Not if you clap right. Most people clap with their palms flat: cupping them makes a lot more noise and you can keep it up much longer. You only see flamenco artists clapping with their hands flat when they want to get that specific noise; most of the time it’s cupped hands.
It should be noted that there is controversy over whether this is a man-made object, as opposed to a naturally occurring one. And if man-made, whether it was made by Neanderthals or Modern Humans. That is noted in your linked article.
Never have so many missed a Hitchhiker’s Guide reference.
When the Volgon come building the highway through half their planet, they will hear the music