Talk:Castanets

plural
Is the name of the instrument singular or plural? Is one of the shells a castanet?

Castanets always come in pairs, I think that the title should reflect this. GerardM (talk) 18:45, 16 November 2008 (UTC)


 * I think so too. By the way, castanets are non-pitched percussion and this article should be put in to Category:Non-pitched percussion. --Number Googol (talk) 01:23, 14 June 2009 (UTC)

This article is rather ethnocentric in the way it is written. It assumes that Castanets are pretty much only used, as a contemporary practice, in Spanish music and uses terminology like "macho" to describe a larger castanet as if it's a universal term and not just a term used for spanish speaking traditions. Castanets are used heavily in Italian folk music and other modern folk music traditions and they have different terminology and usage. Instead of perpetuating the western idea that castanets are simply a "spanish instrument" the article should strive to be more objective and better informed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.87.190.134 (talk) 16:50, 26 November 2009 (UTC)

I have changed the order of the paragraphs to include a section explaining the specific use of the castanets in Spain. The idea was to also include some sub sections about Italy, Portugal etc by translating information from each language of wikipedia but for my surprise they all refer only to castanets in Spanish music. So I wonder whether I should set the changes back or leave as it is now in hope that someone else with add the missing info? --188.134.45.75 (talk) 08:03, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Pitched or unpitched
I've moved this article from Category:Pitched percussion to Category:Unpitched percussion. Although the two sets may have higher and lower tones, this doesn't make them pitched, any more than timbales, bongo drums or tom-tom drums are pitched. Andrewa (talk) 16:54, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

History??
Would love to read on the history from anyone qualified to add it here. Were these a mainstay in Renaissance Spain? how about medieval times? Are there predecessors? Also, as they seem to be the most rapid percussion instrument maybe short of snare only, a discussion on clicks per minute would be interesting! 147.129.213.98 (talk) 16:16, 23 March 2016 (UTC)