Historical oddities: Who was the father of dark music? The vote must go overwhelmingly to Richard Wagner, the 19th century German composer who wrote so much immortal opera music. He was the first composer to regularly include the strange Octobass in his orchestration. The Octobass was a monstrous instrument that required two men to play it, one to use the bow and the other to stand on a chair and press the strings. Wagner loved the Octobass because he said it added a darkness that no other instrument could deliver. Some of its lower notes were below the threshold of normal human hearing. Members of the first audiences exposed to the instrument described an unimaginably sensational new experience of having their guts shaken about and the theatre filled with an almost tangible tension. This sounds like an ideal instrument for a drone metal band. Heres a modern version of it. You can skip to halfway through the video to hear the Octobass used in an actual melody (of sorts). ~ Mammal youtube/watch?v=FP1QqtGe8ts
Posted on: Tue, 05 Nov 2013 14:06:11 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015