Glockenspiel, Percussion Instrument

With a name that means, "the hitting of one body against another," instruments in the percussion family are played by being struck, shaken, or scraped. In the orchestra, the percussion section provides a variety of rhythms, textures and tone colors. Percussion instruments are classified as tuned or untuned. Tuned instruments play specific pitches or notes, just like the woodwind, brass and string instruments. Untuned instruments produce a sound with an indefinite pitch, like the sound of a hand knocking on a door. The percussion instruments are an international family, with ancestors from the Middle East, Asia, Africa, the Americas and Europe representing musical styles from many different cultures.

Also called orchestra bells, the glockenspiel resembles a small xylophone, but it is made of steel bars. The glockenspiel is typically played with wooden or plastic mallets, producing a high tuned sound that is bright and penetrating. The name glockenspiel comes from the German language and means "to play the bells."

Glockenspiel

The glockenspiel is a musical instrument in the percussion family. It is similar to the xylophone, in that it has tuned bars laid out in a fashion resembling a piano keyboard. The xylophone's bars are wooden, while the glockenspiel's are metal, thus making it a metallophone. The glockenspiel, moreover, is much smaller and higher in pitch.

When used in a marching or military band, the bars are sometimes mounted in a portable case and held vertically, sometimes in a lyre-shaped frame. In orchestral use, the bars are mounted horizontally. A pair of hard unwrapped mallets, made of rubber, plastic, or metal, are generally used to strike the bars, although if laid out horizontally, a keyboard may be attached to the instrument to allow chords to be more easily played.

The glockenspiel's range is limited to the upper register, and usually covers about two and a half to three octaves. The glockenspiel is a transposing instrument; its parts are written two octaves below concert pitch. When struck, the bars give a very pure, bell-like sound.

Glockenspiels are still quite popular and appear in almost all genres of music ranging from hip hop to jazz.

One classical piece where such an instrument is used is Mozart's Die Zauberflöte. (this part, like many others, calls for a keyboard glockenspiel. The part is sometimes performed on a celesta, which, however, sounds quite different from the intended effect.) A modern example of the glockenspiel is Steve Reich's 1974 composition Drumming, in which the glockenspiel becomes a major instrument in the 3rd and 4th movements.

Other instruments which work on the same struck-bar principle as the glockenspiel include the marimba and the vibraphone. There are also many glockenspiel-like instruments in Indonesian gamelan ensembles.