Chapter 78 Octave

The ancients classified musical instruments according to different production materials. In Western music, wind instruments were first divided into two categories: woodwind and brass according to the different production materials.Today, although woodwind flutes and piccolos have been made of metal, they still belong to the woodwind category.In ancient China, musical instruments were divided into eight categories, called "eight tones", which is what "Zhou Li·Chunguan·Taishi" said, "all broadcast with eight tones: gold, stone, earth, leather, silk, wood, etc. , Pao, Bamboo".

Gold: bell, 镈, 錞 (錞 in), duo stone: chime Soil: Xun, Fou Leather: drum, drum Silk: Qin, Se, Zhu, Zheng Wood: 柷, 敔 Pao: Sheng, Yu Bamboo: flute, pipe, chi, 籥 This is the division method of the ancients. According to the development of modern musical instruments, some of them are no longer used, such as 柷, 敔, 缶, Chi, 籥, Zhu, etc., while a large number of new musical instruments continue to appear, such as gold instruments. The cymbals, bowls, and gongs in Chinese musical instruments, wooden fish and boards in wooden instruments, cucurbit silk and gourd sheng in gourd musical instruments, and pipa, yangpi, erhu, ruan, and sanxian in stringed instruments.