Folk Musical Instruments and Instrumental Folk Music

by Ulrich Morgenstern

Musical instruments, through their acoustically, optically, haptically perceivable characteristics, possess a high capability for attention and identification. They offer a unique possibility for an understanding of music cultures as well as for deepening and extending of one’s own aera of musical experience.

European folk musical instruments and instrumental folk music long ago became a key issue in the research at the IVE, as show the Seminar in European Ethnomusicology (Seminar zur Europäischen Musikethnologie) on the violin (1971) and the drone (1973), launched by Walter Deutsch, as well as numerous publications by Gerlinde Haid and Rudolf Pietsch. Studies by Ulrich Morgenstern necessarily intersect with the topics Musical traditions of the world, Multipart music, and Folk music revival and revitalization movements.

A comparative perspective on folk musical instruments of Europe shows peculiarities of local and regional music traditions as well as their common traits. Thus, they stand for cultural diversity and intercultural exchange as well as for vertical transfer processes. They clearly demonstrate the permeability of the borders and the innovativeness in folk music.

See also Publication list Morgenstern.