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Category: Musical Instruments

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Great and Good Friends: An Exhibition That Showcases the Library’s Thai Instruments

Posted by: Cait Miller

The following is a guest post from Lara Szypszak, Concert Assistant for the Music Division. An upcoming exhibition in Bangkok at the Queen Sirikit Museum of Textiles (running March 21 through June 30) highlights 200 years of U.S.-Thai friendship, and is thus aptly titled Great and Good Friends. A few of our instruments, including hand …

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Higdon’s Viola Concerto: A Library of Congress Commission and a Grammy Nom!

Posted by: Cait Miller

The 2018 Grammy nominations were announced this morning, and among the lineup you can find a work co-commissioned by the Library of Congress! Pulitzer Prize winner and American composer Jennifer Higdon’s Viola Concerto was co-commissioned by the Library of Congress (with support from the family of Cameron and Jane Baird, and John J. Medveckis), the …

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King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand (1927-2016)

Posted by: Cait Miller

The following post is co-written with Musical Instruments Curator Carol Lynn Ward-Bamford. Early yesterday morning the world learned of the death of Thailand’s King Bhumibol Adulyadej, crowned in 1946 and known as the world’s longest-reigning monarch. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts and educated in Switzerland and the United States, King Bhumibol was interested in musical performance …

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Flute Blowout

Posted by: Cait Miller

While perusing The Wall Street Journal earlier this month, Musical Instrument Curator Carol Lynn Ward-Bamford happened upon a review of Canadian photographer Todd McLellan’s new book Things Come Apart and she stopped in her tracks. There she saw a photograph of a bicycle’s parts laid out neatly, grouped with like pieces (an example from his …

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And the Strads Play On…

Posted by: Cait Miller

The Strads. They make string players salivate, and everyone knows the name to be synonymous with excellence. But how much do you really know about these pristine creatures of sound? Let’s start with the name – “Stradivarius”. Many are at least familiar with the fact that these string instruments were created by the famous violin …