The World Of Wind Chimes
Wind chimes are not just pretty decorations to hang up around the house or garden which happen to create noise every now and then.
They have actually been used in real music, from high-brow modern music to popular everyday fare such as videogame soundtracks.
The French composer Oliver Messiaen has written for glass, wood, and seashell chimes in his opera according to Saint Francis of Assisi, while David Sitek of the American rock band TV on the Radio often hangs a wind chime at the end of his guitar for texture.
Possibly the most famous unknown use of wind chimes in the world was made by Koji Kondo, lead musician at Nintendo, the Japanese videogaming giant.
He is accountable for the music in such bestsellers as Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda, and has incorporated chiming sounds throughout his work, such as the theme for the “Vanilla Dome” world (or stage – that is, game level) in the sequel Super Mario World.
However, it should be noted that musical instruments already can be found which employ chimes or chime-like hardware.
Certainly, one such device, a mark tree, is also often known as a chime tree or a group of bar chimes.
It is played out by sweeping a finger or stick through the length of hanging cylinders, typically made of metal though of varying lengths.
These cylinders are hung from a bar and mounted in pitch order.
Very similar instruments include tubular bells and the bell tree.
Like wind chimes proper, they are usually thought of as percussion instruments, generally used by musical color.
Tubular bells, however, can produce harmonic spectra
and so are capable of melodies.
But these are usually very simple, and few solos are written for tubular bells.
One noteworthy use of the instrument is made by the animated television series Futurama, for its theme.
In the 1980s, the famous children’s show Sesame Street also featured tubular bells through part of its ending credits.