Vibraphone
The vibraphone in five languages — vibraphone, vibrafono, Vibraphon
Related
Five languages
| Language | Name |
|---|---|
| Chinese | 颤音琴 |
| English | vibraphone |
| Italian | vibrafono |
| German | Vibraphon |
| French | vibraphone |
The vibraphone is a metal-bar keyboard percussion instrument. Resonator tubes hang below the bars, each with a rotating disc driven by a motor, producing the periodic volume pulsation behind the name. English vibraphone joins vibrato with -phone; Italian vibrafono, German Vibraphon and French vibraphone share the root, and Chinese also says 电颤琴 (a common usage).
Watch out: vibraphone and marimba are both mallet-struck bar instruments, but the vibraphone has metal bars and motor-driven vibrato, the marimba wooden bars and resonators that sustain the tone; calling both 木琴 loses the distinction.
Read deeper → Vibraphone
Sources
- 各语种乐器名与 vibraphone 的构词，参 The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, "Vibraphone"；译名依通行音乐术语词典；本文为原创表述
Used for fact-checking only; all prose is original.