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Berlioz, Treatise on Instrumentation

Hector Berlioz · section 53 of 67

The Tenor Drum

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The tenor drum is somewhat longer than the ordinary drum, and its body is made of wood instead of metal. Its sound is dull and similar to that of a drum without snares, ie. of a muffled drum. It makes quite a good. effect in military music, and its subdued rolls serve as a

background for the other drums. It is a tenor dram which

Gluck uses in the chorus of Scythians in his “Iphigénie en Tauride” for beating the barbarous rhythm of the continuous four eighths-notes (see Example 148, p,392). Richard Wagner employed it magnificently in the Ride of the Valkyries to produce a wild roaring effect,