The words of this song performed by the hot Estonian guy Tõnis Mägi are probably remembered by everyone who remembers the Soviet Union. Indeed, what will happen if the music is stopped? In his case, a girl who does not notice him would stop dancing with another. And in ours it is a little more complicated. Let us recall the common saying that architecture is frozen music. Is this really the case?
What is music and where does it come from, probably no need to explain. Each nation has its own national musical instruments, which have been passed down from generation to generation for more than one hundred years.
Absolutely all peoples have musical instruments, even the indigenous population of the outskirts of our planet. They are found in large numbers in the funds of museums (see the main photo). Looking at the guitars from above, you begin to think that the multi-armed Indian god probably still existed. How can you play with both hands on these guitars?
Or even such. What kind of guitar is this anyway? Judging by the picture, she doesn't even lie on a chair, but seems to be standing on a regular stand. However, I am not a musician and I will not evaluate her expertly. Nevertheless, there is a lot of evidence of the existence of such strange musical instruments in the very recent past now in the archives.
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Has anyone seen such tools in use now? And even at the end of the 19th century, they were in wide circulation.
And over the years, these instruments have disappeared, like many other mysterious artifacts of the 19th century. You can find them only in antiques sales ads or museums, and even then not in all. How can this be explained? We turn on the logic.
What can these instruments have in common and what is missing now and then at all? That's right, this is it.
What is this harmless detail and why did it disappear? Nevertheless, at the beginning of the 20th century, rudiments of this part are already made on instruments, and then they disappear on later models.
In the 20th century, pianos returned to the form in which we see them today.
Try to guess why the pipe from the stove on the left in the photo bifurcates in a strange way and then merges again into one. The answer will be at the end of the article, and it will also have something to do with music.
Let's go further.
What can be played on such an instrument? Even three thieves' chords will not work here. Nevertheless, such a tool was, and was used.
It is difficult to say what it was called, but in Asia it was quite common. And the same knobs that have disappeared from the harps and piano are present on it. And not only on it.
This is kamancha, another Asian musical instrument. They say about him that he has passed through the centuries unchanged. The knob is also present on it.
And here the knob exceeds all conceivable dimensions. Did he influence the sound quality? In this case, most likely a tribute to tradition. Once this instrument looked exactly like this, now it is also done this way, without delving into the meaning. East is a delicate matter.
There is an equally strange instrument in India called vima. Why does he need such an interesting stand when it can be done much easier? Probably, this is also a tribute to tradition.
This is a gusli, which is credited with origin in Russia. As you can see, there is also some kind of incomprehensible metal object in the upper left corner. However, in Europe there was also an instrument that resembled a gusli in its shape. From whom to whom this tool came, now it is no longer possible to install.
Feels like the left and right sides of this instrument are not made of wood.
And what do they have inside? A very strange instrument. However, he was there too.
On many old cellos (by the way, not only on cellos), instead of a characteristic curl at the end, you sometimes see someone's decorative heads. Moreover, all other parts of cellos, even the bows, are always and everywhere the same and differ only in size. How to understand this fact? Very simple. Both the curls and the head are a replacement for a certain part that was on the cellos before and which has disappeared. This detail had its own functionality, which was lost. Nevertheless, cellos with that detail are found in their original form at antique auctions. But for some reason, the auction site does not give the large size of this item, however, like any other strange antiques. This is understandable, knowledgeable people will understand what's what without it.
There are still many questions to wind instruments, but probably enough without them. However, no, you still need to talk about the most important wind instrument.
Everyone knows what an organ is. Its principle of operation is reduced to supplying compressed air to the desired tube or several tubes, and they emit a sound of the desired tonality. The same principle as in a pipe, flute, or even a whistle. As they now explain, in every temple at the organ there is a secret room where junior attendants blew air into a special container with horns. Compressors may be in use now. But if you look at this unit, it is very difficult to understand how the air was blown into just this one. Or such:
These tools have all the hallmarks of mobility. Was one playing and the other pumping a pump nearby? It's not aesthetically pleasing. The secret of this tool, apparently, must be sought in something else.
As you can see, the organs in the 19th century were equipped with the same incomprehensible devices that eventually either disappeared or were replaced with dummies. Nothing new.
As you can see, the organ secret is quite simple. Inside it was a Stirling engine in its old versions, which drove air into a container located under it. This engine, of course, was not rotated by muscular force, its principle of operation is described in other articles. And this is nothing but the work of atmospheric electricity from the dome of the temple. In mobile organs, it was the same, only on a small scale.
Everything is the same, and even the light bulbs on the chandelier are again without wires. By the way, another interesting detail. In Europe, this instrument is called an orgy (not what you thought), but in Russia it was politically correctly called an organ. But as we have repeatedly seen on balls and balls, there are no two identical names in European languages for different objects quite by accident. And these two are also connected or connected in the past. And what could connect such a tool and something that you shouldn't think about? Most likely the fact that one could not do without the other. Or, if it is more understandable, there was a group connection, but not the same one, but a spiritual one. This is difficult to understand, but let's try.
And this is most likely a hybrid of a piano and a harp. But compare its shape to the ovens from here. What it is? Well, let's probably finish with the tools here. I hope it became clear to everyone that people perceived music from them not only with their ears. What we see (hear) with these instruments now is about the same as the top of an iceberg or a donut hole. But what substance did these musical instruments modulate with their tone? Probably, it has already become clear to everyone that by themselves, taken separately, they play the same way as now. And for the full effect, another, frozen music is needed, i.e. architecture. We return to the beginning.
Those same Mamluks in Egypt, it turns out, were musical people. Their very one-stringed instruments were always played in such tents. They were called بالاخانه, or simply and in Russian a booth.
A balagan in Russia was called not only structures for circus performances. These were all similar designs, regardless of purpose. According to the works of Mamin-Sibiryak, any temporary dwellings of hunters, workers and just vagrants were called a booth. There were a great many of them. But for some reason this definition has survived only for the circus.
There is another interesting published work - “In the arena of the old circus. Notes of a Clown / Dmitry Alperov; Lit. processing, foreword. and approx. V. E. Beklemisheva. - Moscow: Goslitizdat, 1936. Despite the fact that the publication clearly passed the Soviet censorship, there are still interesting moments about booths there.
What lamps are we talking about? The kerosene lamps "Lightning", which were produced in the 20th century, were not inserted into the brackets in any way, and their light would hardly have been enough to illuminate the stage so that it could be seen well enough. Most likely, these lamps were named so because they were the successors of some other lamps. The author of the book retells the memoirs of his father and grandfather, who were engaged in booths, and judging by the dating of the book, this happened in the second half of the 19th century. What kind of lamps were in the booths?
These booths with such lamps were, oddly enough, spread all over the world from China to America.
In Europe, these booths were politically correctly called music kiosks.
How these booth-booths worked can be understood only from the pictures.
There are no photographs of working music kiosks with the lights on. There are single copies, but this is already with artificially supplied electric lighting. Those photos that are available give only a general view.
This is a music kiosk in Paris in the early 20th century. It can be seen that the dome has not yet been dismantled.
This is a music kiosk from the American resort of Saratoga of the second half of the 19th century, described here. Notice how far the spectators' chairs are from this kiosk. Could people normally hear music at such a distance, or did something amplify it there? Or maybe they came to feel it?
This is a music kiosk in Cairo in the second half of the 19th century. The then ruler of Egypt, Ismail Pasha, set up a great number of such kiosks, despite the fact that the central Tahrir Square was sunk into the ground and most of Cairo's buildings were destroyed. Culture comes first. And what about Russia? As always, on a grand scale.
As you probably already guessed, an electric field was created inside these booths due to the atmosphere, and musical instruments somehow modulated this field with their vibrating parts. The perception of music went not only through the ears, but also through the brain. Once something like that, but without details, they wanted to convey to us, if I'm not mistaken, in the television program Malakhov +, but something was conveyed somehow one-sidedly. It happens.
But that's just music. But what about the poetic works that were performed to this music? In this regard, there are also some strange artifacts at antique auctions, the image of which is only in small sizes.
This is not a gyroscope or tellurium, but quite a similar analogue of a microphone from the 19th century. It is simply called a tool. Only in its appearance it looks more like a tabernacle, which was once the prototype of a microphone.
Probably, many people remember the half-true story that after the arrival of the Holstein-Gottorp ("Romanovs") to Russia, they liquidated as a class all the buffoons along with their musical instruments - gusli, etc. There is interesting material on this topic here.
As you can see, the thieves' expression "bazaar-station" in translation is just a harmless fair-booth. And with the buffoons, everything happened exactly the same as with everything else spiritual. What existed in churches, namely a highly spiritual connection and grace, turns out to be happening in parallel among the people in the form of booths with buffoons and gusli in the appropriate format. Well, in fact, both were destroyed, except that the church was annexed to the state and left in some kind of sham. The buffoons and their tools were less fortunate. As already mentioned, other booths arose instead of them, but this was not the same. However, the magic of music for the wealthy still remained available throughout the world until the late 19th century. And then, after the global cultural and industrial degradation, music came to the way we see it now. The most important music was gone - frozen, and not frozen, too, stopped.
Some attempts by enthusiasts to recreate the gusli, play something on them and post a video with a patriotic idea on YouTube are now being very active. Has anyone heard how they sound there? I'm not a connoisseur of homespun content, so I can't objectively judge it. I hope that after reading this article, these videos will look different. And by the way, all antique violins with curls at the ends are a product of the second half of the 19th century. The last paragraph, however, like the entire article, I ask you to consider the private opinion of the author.
P. S. The bifurcation of the pipe above the oven mentioned above is also a product of cultural and industrial degradation. If we imagine that earlier, annular horizontal electric currents from the dome went through this pipe into the furnace and heated it, then after such a bifurcation, the currents could no longer enter the furnace, this is obvious and not difficult to imagine. Thus, they forced the owners of the stoves to switch to conventional fuel. Such devices are very common in the photo.