Complete Encyclopaedia of Music/A/Aeolian harp, lyre

Aeolian harp, lyre, or ANEMOCHORD. A. musical instrument, first described by Kircher,* which produces the most delicate and enchanting tones merely by the impulse of the wind. It is composed of a rectangular box, made of very thin deal, of the same width as the window in which it is placed, and about five inches deep and six inches wide. Over the upper surface of this box, which is pierced with sounding holes, like the sounding board of the fiddle, are stretched several catgut or wire strings, with a slight degree of tension. When these strings are in unison, and the instrument exposed in the window to the action of a gentle breeze, they will emit the most agreeable combination of wild and melting sounds, changing from one harmonic of the string to another, according to the varying impulse of wind, and its unequal action on the different parts of the vibrating strings. In the Aeolian harp constructed by the Rev. W. Jones, the strings, instead of being on the outside, are fastened to a sounding board within a wooden case, and the wind is conveyed to the strings through a horizontal aperture. The instrument may then be used even in the open air. Dr. Young says, to remove all uncertainty in the order of the notes in the lyre, I took off all the strings but one ; and on placing the instrument in a due position, was surprised to hear a great variety of notes, and frequently such as were not produced by any aliquot part of the string ; often, too, I heard a chord of two or three notes from this single string. Discords are also often heard from the unison strings of this instrument ; the cause of which is evident from the manner in which the notes are generated ; for the aliquot parts of a string contain in themselves an infinite variety of discords.