Sublime Harmonie
By Jim Heyworth
Robbie asks, "What is Sublime Harmonie?" Pardon my misspelling, "Sublime Harmony." Blame it on my cerebral software drivers incorrectly programmed to my flying fingers on the keyboard.
The quick answer for the organ folk is that it is similar to a "Voix Celeste" organ stop which plays a rank of pipes deliberately set to be very slightly out of tune with the rest of the organ. When this stop is drawn one of the in-tune ranks is forced to play at the same time. This causes a "Heavenly Voices" (in some people's opinion) audible beat akin to a vibrato.
To be more precise, I don't think I could say it any better that A.W.J.G Ord-Hume in his book "Collecting Musical Boxes and How To Repair Them:"
"... The 'Sublime Harmonie' featured two combs of the same length,
playing as one comb. This necessitated the cylinder being set so
that it had, in effect, two bass ends and two trebles. A very pleasing
sound was thus created by the careful voicing and sympathetic
resonance between the two sets of teeth. Some long combs were
produced in two halves purely as a matter of convenience, and should
not be confused with the genuine two-comb 'Sublime Harmonie'."
I should point out, at this juncture, that the Polyphon referred to in yesterday's question plays the upper and lower combs, each having a similar but not identical scale, separately and not necessarily together. The possibility is there, nevertheless, to have the Sublime Harmonie effect if the two are tuned slightly differently and chosen by the disc to play the same note simultaneously on both combs. Hence my question.
Jim Heyworth,
Sechelt, B.C., Canada
[ Got it! Thanks for the explanation, Jim. -- Robbie |
(Message sent Mon 17 Feb 1997, 18:25:41 GMT, from time zone GMT-0800.) |
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