What do we actually know about the zither?
Last year, a seminar and concert of the Vienna Zither Quartet, led by Mrs. Hannelore Laister, took place at the Janáček Conservatory in Ostrava. The event was organized by the Ostrava Zither Club Radegast. The concert featured chamber works by Dall'Ábac (Sonata Op.l, No.4), GF Handel (Sarabande), WA Mozart (Menuet from the Symphony in G minor), FG Knotzinger (Homage to J.S. Bach) and J. Strauss (melodies from the operetta The Bat). The contemporary form of the zither is relatively young (approx. 150 - 180 years old) and therefore these works were performed in transcriptions by renowned authors FG Knotzinger and H. Pröll. From the more recent production of Viennese zither composers, works by the aforementioned FG Knotzinger (1908 -1993) and Gert Last (born 1921) were performed. The end of the concert was dedicated to modern contemporary compositions and variations (Led Zeppelin) performed solo by the young, even Czech zitherist Michal Müller, a student of Ms. Hannelore Laister at the Vienna Conservatory.
The concert was of an excellent artistic level and convincingly showed the students and professors of the Janáček Conservatory the possibilities of this instrument. Changes in dynamics, rhythm, and tonal color were very well presented in the aforementioned compositions. The affinity with the guitar, which is obvious from the identical nomenclature, is given by the similar type of fingerboard with melodic strings (and thus by the similar method and similar possibilities of creating tones - trills, tremolos, strokes, staccato, breaks, legato, glissando, covers, natural and artificial flageolets, vibrato, etc.). The zither shares with the piano the method of writing notes in two staves (in the treble clef, the left-hand melodic strings and in the bass clef, the free accompanying strings). The system of arranging the accompanying strings naturally allows playing in any key. The total range of tones is considerable, approximately 6 to 6.5 octaves (approximately 3 octaves on the accompaniment strings and 4 octaves on the melody strings - with partial overlap).
The response among the teaching staff to the concert was very positive, but it could also be expressed as follows: "what was heard is a completely different instrument than how it is described in encyclopedic publications. How is this possible?"
If the uninitiated wants to get to know this instrument better, they have relatively few opportunities and information to do so. If they have not seen one of the zither exhibitions ("Zither in Bohemia" in Cheb in 1988, "Zither my instrument" in Havířov and Frýdek-Místek in 1995 and "Zither in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia" in Prague at Hradčany in 1996), or if they have not found a little-known monograph on this topic (Folprecht Jan: Zither in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia, 1996) or have not leafed through one of the articles by Doc. Dr. L. Kunze (e.g.: The Return of Zither Playing in the Czech Lands, Collection IV OKS Příbram, 1989), they have no choice but to turn to books devoted to encyclopedic overviews of musical instruments, or directly to encyclopedias. But what can be read there?
A concise factual dictionary (Jakub Malý, Prague 1875, volume II) goes as far as the ancient mythology of Amphion and emphasizes the material of the strings (which is not the essence of the instrument). Otto's educational dictionary (Prague 1882, 5th volume) somewhat confuses the reader by describing partly a version that was developed earlier (i.e. the kobza or the šajtholt). A contemporary illustrated encyclopedic dictionary (Academia, Prague 1982) devotes only a few lines to the zither, but at least it does not distort anything.
In Antonín Modr's book "Hudební nástroje", which was published in its eighth edition from 1938 to 1997, a short paragraph is dedicated to the zither, ending with the sentence: "... The zither has a clear and pleasant, but monotonous tone. It is a good folk instrument...." Did the author confuse the classical zither with the so-called "chord zither" (also called table harp, etc.)? The above statement can undoubtedly be applied to this.
Josef Hutter (see ref. no. 3) completely ignores the zither as an instrument and only presents curious variants of stringed zithers in the pictorial appendix.
In 1994, Jos. Kotek published the book "History of Czech Popular Music and Singing of the 19th and 20th Centuries". A short paragraph devoted to the zither in the first part draws attention to the information that it is an episodic matter in our countries. The above-mentioned exhibitions have proven the opposite.
Even greater inaccuracies can be found in Pavel Kurfürst's recent publication "Organologie" (published by Georgius, Hradec Králové, 1998). Correction of errors and inaccuracies would take up a separate article. The half-truths stated here are slipping into a tendentious character, which I will illustrate with only two examples: I consider the pejorative synonyms "Prunk, dulcimer, cinkadlo, zebradlo..." mentioned in the very first sentence to be not only inappropriate, but also unknown. (I searched in vain for a similar synonym "arbitrary zither box" in the article about the piano.) And what about the correctness of the statement "...in non-concert performances, playing the zither is often simplified...". Yes, that is true, but isn't it true for other instruments?
Before World War I, a professional magazine called "Český citerista" was published in Prague (since 1891) and there were many Czech cither clubs. No one would have thought of seeing anything un-Czech in playing the cither (see lit. no. 13). However, since the end of World War I, the cither has begun to be viewed through a national lens, and that is quite distorted. So to this day, we like to confirm that it is a foreign instrument (first Austrian, then Great German) and that it is musically inferior. All of this means that for us in Bohemia and Moravia, there is no need to deal with it in more detail. The statement of Mr. Adolf Mainel from Marneukirchen, one of the most renowned zither manufacturers in Europe, made after seeing my zither exhibition in Cheb, sounds like a balm to my soul: " The exhibition convincingly demonstrated the independent and continuous development of zithers in the Czech lands from the Middle Ages to the present. I had no idea until then how excellent instruments were being produced not far from us ".
As a result of persistent attitudes from the beginning of the century, this once very widespread instrument in our country was forgotten (almost half of all zithers made in Europe were made in our country) and the low level of awareness about it was reflected in the selected half-truths I cited above, which are worse than untruths, because they are essentially irrefutable. These half-truths have been persistently and repeatedly described for the last fifty years.
In our club's archive we have over 5500 pieces of sheet music for the zither by approximately 1200 authors. These include both adaptations of older serious literature and folk songs and also popular opera and operetta melodies of the time, and compositions written directly for the zither. There are also many compositions by Czech zither authors (JFBernhardt, V.Buchelt, Fr. Cibula, K.Cibula, J. Formánek, G.A.Kraml, Jos.Novák, A.Opitz, E.Pavel, E.Vondráček and many others) and by those who left Bohemia for abroad (J.Stanislav, A.Smeták, F.Kolmánek, J.Neukirchner, F.Rezek, E.Kleibl, R.A.Kabátek and others).
In the Ostrava Zither Club Radegast we try to influence the public and present real evidence. So, as the chairman of this club, I organized the aforementioned exhibitions, several meetings of Czech zither players (in the years 1990 - 1994), in addition to many articles, I wrote the aforementioned monograph and last year organized the 1st International Congress of Zither Players in Rožnov, Republic of Cracow, which was attended by 150 participants from twelve countries of the world.
I would like to invite the professional community to discuss how to eliminate the vicious circle between preserved archaic opinions and little interest from both the lay and professional public. This problem is general and does not only concern zithers (see, for example, lit. no. 18).
Without claiming to have a patent on the only possible and correct description of the zither, I would like to contribute to ensuring that in five, ten or fifty years there will still be no professional literature reflecting the views of the late 19th century. I therefore offer the following encyclopedic description of the zither:
The zither is a multi-stringed plucked instrument with a flat body. It is placed on a table and played while sitting.
The body of the zither consists of a top plate with a sound hole (one or more), a lower resonant plate, a headstock with mechanics (for tensioning the melody strings) and pins (for tensioning the free accompanying strings using a key) and an opposing tailpiece equipped with a fret. The top and bottom plates are connected around the circumference by a lip and the entire surface is veneered. The inside of the body is reinforced with several ribs, which serve to strengthen it, since the tension of the strings is considerable. A fingerboard with chromatically spaced metal frets is attached to the top plate along the edge. The opposite edge of the body is usually cut out in an S-shape. The bottom of the zither is equipped with three legs with metal spikes. The legs serve to transfer resonance to the table top (to amplify the sound) and the spikes ensure a stable position (so that the zither does not slide on the table).
The soundboards are usually made of spruce, Luby, and the veneers are usually made of maple or rosewood. The fingerboard is usually made of ebony.
Stringing: The strings are tensioned parallel to the upper soundboard and are of two types: Above the fretboard with frets there are five melody strings and then (parallel to them) the free accompaniment strings (chord, bass and double bass), which are usually 27 to 37 (depending on the equipment with double bass strings). The normal tuning of the melody strings is shown in Fig. 1. The so-called Viennese tuning, captured in the same picture, is also common in our country.
The tuning of the accompaniment strings is the so-called quarto-fifth, i.e. the tuning of the neighboring strings decreases in the interval of a fourth, which, however, is interrupted after two to three intervals by an octave rise (practically by a fifth) and so all tones of the range are alternated in the accompaniment. The practical significance of this tuning (see Fig. 1), which was introduced by Nikolas Weigl in 1838, lies in the stable form of the frets of the accompanying fifth chords and in the mutual adjacency of the basic chords of the respective key.
The way of playing is that the ring finger on the thumb of the right hand plucks the melody on the fretboard (melodic) strings, controlled by the fingers of the left hand, and the other fingers of the right hand play the accompaniment at the same time (by various combinations of strokes of the accompanying strings).
Notes for the zither are written (as for the piano) in two musical staffs - in treble clef for the melodic notes and in bass clef for the accompanying notes.
History of the development and production of zithers: The predecessor of the zither, as we know it over the past 150 years, were folk musical instruments called šajtholt in the Alpine regions, hummel in Sweden, langleik in Norway, langspil in Denmark and kobza in our countries. Instruments similar to the kobza (šajtholt) have been used since time immemorial and are still used today all over the world, from East Asia to Africa (see lit. no. 5).
At the beginning of the 19th century, in areas where the šajtholt was used, these old plucked zithers were transformed into plucked multi-stringed instruments. Weigel's principle of stringing laid the foundation for the modern zither. The leading places in terms of the development, production and use of zithers were Vienna and Munich. A famous player was Johann Petzmayer (1803 - 1884), a court virtuoso of Prince Maximilian of Bavaria.
The first types of zithers were called according to their place of origin: Salzburg and Mittenwald forms. The beginnings of zither production in Munich are associated with the names: Franz Kren, Ignaz Simon and Georg Tiefenbrunner. The founder of mass production of quality zithers was Anton Kiendl in Vienna and Mathias Amberger in Munich. At the end of the 19th century, there were dozens of excellent manufacturers in Europe.
The Czech lands were not left aside either, as evidenced not only by the preserved instruments of Antonín Mitáš from Litoměřice and Bernard Berkmajer from Jihlava (from the early 19th century), but also by the later production in the Ore Mountains - represented in particular by Antonín Bräuer from Luby (Schönbach). One of the first documented zither players in our country was František Dvořák, the father of the composer Antonín Dvořák. The great Czech pioneers of playing the zither were the brothers Karel and František Cibulové. They published a large number of their own compositions and several schools of playing.
The contemporary top production in Europe is represented by the names Adolf Meinel and Horst Wünsche from Markneukirchen and Ernst Volkmann in Ingolstadt. Today the zither is no longer as closely or as intensely tied to the Central European region as it was at the end of the last century. It is spread, albeit sparingly, throughout the world, and is now particularly popular in Japan and the USA.
The division of zithers has settled into four size categories and several shapes. The basic type is the treble zither, whose first fretboard string is tuned to "chamber A" and the scale of the fretboard strings is 410 to 430 mm. The
so-called fifth zithers are tuned a fifth higher, and have a scale of approximately 390 mm.
The alto (elegic) zithers are tuned a fourth lower than the treble zithers, with a scale of 505-510 mm.
Bass zithers are tuned an octave lower and have a scale of approximately 570 mm.
Common treble zithers tend to have 27 to 29 accompanying strings. Those with more are called concert zithers, and the top type of concert zithers are the so-called harp zithers, which tend to have about 37 accompanying strings, a scale length of up to 440 mm, and are primarily characterized by a decorative column that reinforces the cutout of the body (see Fig. 2).
The current progressive design of zithers are the instruments of E. Volkmann, built in the form of a psaltery, i.e. with a trapezoidal body and three sound holes with rosettes.
Ostrava 1999
Author: Doc. Ing. Jan Folprecht, Ph.D.
Masarykovo nám. 20
Ostrava 701 00
phone/fax: 59 611 30 96
mobile 603 424 813
Literature:
1) Malý Jakub:Stručný slovník věcný, díl II., Praha 1875
2) Otto J.:Ottův slovník naučný (5 sv.), Praha 1882
3) Hutter Josef: Hudební nástroje, Fr.Novák, Praha 1945
4) Modr Antonín: Hudební nástroje, Supraphon, Praha (6. vyd.), 1977
5) Buchner Antonín: Hudební nástroje národů, Artia l969
6) Brandlmeier Josef: Handbuch der Zither I, II, München 1963, 1979
7) Kunz Ludvík: Die Volksmusikinstrumente der Tschechoslowakei, Teil I, Handbuch der Europäischen Volksmusikinstrumente, Leipzig 1974
8) Kunz Ludvík: Návrat citerové hry v Českých zemích, Sb.IV, OKS Příbram 1989
9) Kotek Josef: Dějiny české populární hudby a zpěvu (sv.l)19. a 20. století, Academia, Praha 1994
10) Kurfürst Pavel: Organologie, Georgius, Hradec Králové 1998
11) Folprecht Jan: Několik rad začínajícím citeristům, OKD Příbram l987
12) Folprecht Jan: Klub pražských citeristů, OKD Praha 3, 1989
13) Folprecht Jan: Připomenutí historie Klubu českých citeristů v Chicagu, Sb.1991, Konst.Lázně
14) Folprecht Jan : Citera v Čechách, na Moravě a ve Slezsku (Zither in Böhmen, Mähren und Schlezien), Shromáždění Němců v Čechách, Ostrava 1995
15) Michel Andreas: Zithern, Universität Leipzig, 1995
16) Laturell Volker D.:Zwei Jahrhunderte Zithern in München, Preissler 1997, München
17) Hartmann Josef: Die Zither in Wien (Teil I,II), VAMÖ 1997
18) Kleňha Jiří: Harfenictví v Čechách, Granit, Praha 1998
19) Ilustrovaný encyklopedický slovník, Academia, Praha 1982
20) Ross Ingeborg: Wiener Stimmung - Normal Stimmung - Müncher Stimmung .... sind das Religionen?, sb. Konst. Lázně 1991
