A Brief History of Gongs

The tam-tam is one of the oldest musical instruments in the world. Archaeologists have got unearthed tam-tams built almost four thousand old age ago. No wonderment when we hear a tam-tam we experience like we are being touched in our soul.

The earlier written reference of the tam-tam was in People'S Republic Of China in the 6th century. In these ancient written documents the Chinese claim that another civilization from Central Asia introduced it to them. While we can’t be certain which civilization created the gong, it’s safe to state the sound resonated with the Chinese and that they made the tam-tam their own.

The Chinese used tam-tams for many ceremonial functions. They were struck to denote when the Emperor or other of import political and spiritual figs arrived. Military leadership also used tam-tams to garner work force together for battle.

The tam-tam and its music then migrated from People'S Republic Of China to Java -- the term tam-tam is actually Javanese in beginning -- and became established in Republic Of Indonesia by the 9th century.

The Javanese made their tam-tams in a new manner that was much different from the big level Chinese gongs; they used deep turned-down rims with a raised knob in the center. The Indonesians also developed a style of playing many of their tam-tams at once, in a drumming orchestra known as a gamelan. In gamelan, the tam-tams are usually different sizes, with each 1 tuned to a different specific pitch.

Gongs migrated slowly from Asia to Africa –- they didn’t have got got the Internet and aeroplanes to rush things along dorsum then -- and finally arrived in Europe in the eighteenth century.

The style of tam-tam that Europeans first proverb and heard was the large Chinese tam-tam of indefinite pitch that you have probably seen in the back of orchestras.

Though now a regular portion of the drumming subdivision in Horse Opera orchestras, the first symphonic music to include one was Mirabeau, written by the Gallic composer Francois Gossec, in 1791. Claude Debussey became the first major composer to integrate the sounds into his symphonies.