Evening star., 1942-06-07
By Robert Crawford.

Ov N OUCSb ~ 0s~S W
If you have a piano, or organ or
other keyboard instrument, cherish
it, for in years to come 1t may be
q priced heirloom in your family.
The War Production Board has
issued an order which will stop the
production of all musical instru-
ments in a short time, with the
exception of violins, cellos and some
guitars. Uncle Sam needs millions
of pounds of metal, cork, plastic
and rubber, consequently the order
of the WPB applies to all instru-
ments containing more than 10 per
cent by weight Of critical ma
terials."
/ One Of the most interesting COL
lections of keyboard instruments is
the Hugo Worch collection in the
National Museum, which the late
Mr.. Worch spent over 40 years in
acquiring. These instruments rep
resent the forerunners of the piano,
the evolution Of the piano and the
history Of its manufacture in this
country.
Z Besides the Worch collection, there
are in the museum beautiful and
rare examples Of clavichords, harpsi-
chords, clavicytheriums, spinets,
harps and other string instruments
/ dating from the renaissance down
through the 10th century.
F! Mr.. H. w. Krieger, curator of the
collection, one of whose duties 1t
I Is to see that the instruments are
kept in perfect condition to insure
their preservation, is really curator
of ethnology in the Smithsonian,
/ but Is also an authority on the his
tory and evolution of musical in
. struments of all kinds. Curiosity
! was aroused as to why an ethnolo-
gist should act in that capacity, and,
looking around in his gloomy office
at skull specimens Of all the human
race known to man, Mr. Krieger said
1t was quite logical, as an ethnologist
deals with the human race and all
that concerns 1t in culture patterns,
food habits, family. social and
cultural life, including music. poetry
and art.
, Since the morning stars sang
together and David played on his
harp there have been musical in
struments Of one kind or another,
some of which Mr.. Krieger re-
ferred to but said their history
was shrouded in antiquity Going
from the sublime to the ridiculous
he mentioned the hurdy-gurdy as
one of the earliest moni-chords and
described the one in the museum
that dates back to the 18th century
or earlier. This is one of the rarest
pieces in the museum. 1t is, how
ever, not at all like the barrel
organ on which the monkey perches
before passing the hat at the end
OF the organ grinders tune. It is
a stringed instrument shaped like
a guitar, the strings of which are
vibrated by resined wheel at the
large end of the instrument, turned
by a crank and shortened at will
by wooden keys operated by the
fingers of the player.
Some of the spinets in the COL
lection are simply lovely. A rare
one-trunk shaped-decorated with
flowers in colors, dates about 1920,
or earlier: an Italian one of 1860
is a beauty: clavichords. harpsi-
chords, all the great-great-grand-
parents of pianos, melodeons and
the instruments in common use
today. The amazing and interest
ing thing about them is that, like
the Queen Of Spain, none of these
great-greats has any legs. They
sat on tables beautifully made for
the purpose, and some of the smaller
instruments were placed on the
lap of the performer.
The earliest pianos in the museum
are of the time when piano makers
were necessarily fine craftsmen in
wood and highly trained cabinet
makers, because the interior mech
anisms of those early instruments
were very largely of wood. At
about the turn of the 18th century
pianos in America were for the most
mart the work of an individual. At