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Diamond Marimba
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Photo by Will Gullette |
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Dream Time, by Cris Forster |
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Brandis Moylan, Diamond Marimba |
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Built: |
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1978, San Francisco, California. |
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5-Bar Extension: |
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1982, San Diego, California. |
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Rebuilt: |
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1989, San Francisco, California. |
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Dimensions: |
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Total number of bars: 54. |
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Longest bar length: 16 ¾ in. |
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Shortest bar length: 7.0 in. |
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Height to first row: 34.0 in. |
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Height to last row: 40 ½ in. |
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Materials: |
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Honduras rosewood, birch, teak, acrylic, |
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aluminum, brass, and steel. |
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Range: |
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Lowest bar:
G below middle C. |
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Highest bar: Third E above high C. |
The Diamond Marimba has fourteen rows of rosewood bars mounted on a terraced
platform. Beginning with the second row,
each succeeding row rises a half inch above the previous row, so that the
difference in height between the first and the last row equals 6 ½ in.
Each bar is equipped with a tuned acrylic tube
resonator that amplifies the frequency of the bar.
The marimba’s central section consists of a diamond-shaped lattice that includes
seven ascending and seven descending diagonal rows of bars. Each row includes seven bars. Rows that ascend from
left to right sound major tonalities, and rows that descend
from left to right sound minor tonalities.
From my book Musical Mathematics: A Practice in the
Mathematics of Tuning Instruments and Analyzing Scales ( see:
M.M. Pages > Musical Mathematics), below
please find Chapter 12, Figure 4, which illustrates the
frequency ratios of my Diamond Marimba.
(See also:
M.M. Pages >
Meyer's Diamond,
> Partch's Diamond,
> Forster's Diamond.)
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Dear Reader,
Since July 2002, more than 250,000 visitors have logged on to
www.chrysalis-foundation.org. Your interest has encouraged us to plan a
self-publication of Cris Forster's manuscript Musical Mathematics: A
Practice in the Mathematics of Tuning Instruments and Analyzing Scales.
To accomplish this task, we will be applying to organizations and individuals
for grants. Our goal is to publish a complete and unabridged first edition of 500 copies, with a retail
cost of $90.00 per book. If you would like more information on
Mr. Forster's 1300-page manuscript, please visit
our
Musical
Mathematics page,
which shows the Table of Contents of this work.
If you would like to see Musical Mathematics in print,
please write to us so that we may include your emails and letters in our grant
applications. Kindly let us know whether you are a musician,
student, teacher, professor, instrument builder, etc., and indicate any
institutional affiliations you may have. Your name and email address
will only appear in confidential grant applications. We will honor
anyone's wish to remain anonymous.
Please send your email to:
info@chrysalis-foundation.org
or send your letter to:
The Chrysalis Foundation
1459 18th Street, PMB #137
San Francisco, CA 94107
Thank you for your interest and support of the Chrysalis
Foundation book publication project.
The Board of Directors
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