History and Development
While the term zither is mentioned in Daniel during the Jewish exile of 606 BC, the earliest known instrument of the zither family is a Chinese guqin, found in the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng dating from 433 BC.
In modern entertainment, the zither is perhaps most famous for its role in the soundtrack of the classic noir film The Third Man. The music for the film was played by Anton Karas. His "The Third Man Theme" was released as a single in 1949/50 and became a best-seller in the UK. Following its release in the U.S. in 1950, it spent eleven weeks at number one on Billboard's U.S. Best Sellers in Stores chart from 29 April to 8 July. The exposure made Karas an international star, and the trailer for the film stated that "the famous musical score by Anton Karas" would have the audience "in a dither with his zither". Zither music is also the preferred music of Mr. Bevis, a Twilight Zone character in 1960. Kenneth, the eccentric, would-be time traveler in the 2012 film, Safety Not Guaranteed plays and sings a song to his lost love that he composed on his zither.
The instrument has a prominent solo in one of Johann Strauss II's most famous waltzes, "Tales from the Vienna Woods" (sometimes played on a mandolin, when a zither is not available). In Slovenia, at the end of the 19th century they were used in small towns or villages and for concerts. It is also used by multi-instrumentalist Laraaji on the third release of Brian Eno's ambient music series, Ambient 3: Day of Radiance. Australian-born singer Shirley Abicair popularised the zither when she used it widely as accompaniment in her TV shows, live performances and recordings in Britain in the 1950s and 1960s. More recently, Jerusalem-based multi-instrumentalist Bradley Fish has used zithers in a multitude of styles on the soundtracks of various Sony Digital Pictures films. In 2005, Austrian composer Christoph Dientz released a double CD ("Zithered") of zither music recorded using a loop generator, used to give the music the rhythmic drive of European techno, and played using various found objects (paperclips etc) through a guitar amplifier giving a sound pallet similar to John Cage's prepared piano pieces.
Like many other stringed instruments, acoustic and electric forms exist; in the acoustic version, the strings are stretched across the length of the soundbox, and neither version has a neck. They can be divided into two classes: fretted and fretless. A person who plays the zither is called a zitherist.
Read more about this topic: Zither
Famous quotes containing the words history and/or development:
“We know only a single science, the science of history. One can look at history from two sides and divide it into the history of nature and the history of men. However, the two sides are not to be divided off; as long as men exist the history of nature and the history of men are mutually conditioned.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“John B. Watson, the most influential child-rearing expert [of the 1920s], warned that doting mothers could retard the development of children,... Demonstrations of affection were therefore limited. “If you must, kiss them once on the forehead when they say goodnight. Shake hands with them in the morning.””
—Sylvia Ann Hewitt (20th century)