Endangered Crystal, the Art of the Glass Armonica
Last night Meera, the boys, and I had the pleasure of hearing a glass armonica concert titled "Endangered Crystal" featuring William Zeitler , kicking off the 2011 season of The Santa Cruz Baroque Festival , Endangered Musics. Ethereal and enchanting. Previously I had only ever seen and heard glass armonica in the form of wine glasses filled with water. I'd seen photos of Ben Franklin's design , glass bowls lined up concentrically on a rotating cylinder, and was inclined to think perhaps it wasn't practical as far as resonance and amplitude. This concert demonstrated that to be a false assumption. Now I suspect wine glasses are just easier to acquire. The advantage of the Franklin design is that once the glass bells are made, no further tuning is required. Wine glasses with water must be kept in tune by keeping the water levels just so. Water is required to invoke the tone, and Mr. Zeitler claims that Arrowhead bottled water for some reason produces the bes...