User:Andrewa/anvil (music)

The anvil, tuned anvil and tuned anvils are closely related percussion instruments.

The anvil as unpitched percussion
Steel blacksmith's anvils have been used, and continue to be used, as an unpitched percussion instrument, for example in Walton's Belshazzar's Feast (1931) and Josef Strauss' Feuerfest Polka (1869).

For musical purposes, steel anvils are preferred to cast iron, owing to their greater sonority.

The anvil is often played with one or two ball-peen hammers which strike the anvil directly, something a metalworker would never do deliberately, as it risks breaking the hammer head and even damaging the anvil, and transmits greater shock to the hands than hitting the softer work would. Gloves are worn to lessen the shock, and sometimes a matching leather apron which is purely for show. Eye protection is advised.

Tuned anvil
In the introduction to scene three of Das Rheingold (1869), Wagner scored for eighteen anvils: nine little, six mid-sized, and three large, of specified pitches.

More recently, a hollow bar of steel has been used to give a similar sound, sometimes as a more convenient substitute for a tuned blacksmith's anvil, but also as an instrument in its own right.

Tuned anvils
The tuned anvils is keyboard percussion instrument consisting of a set of tuned anvils in the form of hollow steel bars. It is played with specialised hard beaters with bronze heads.

Works

 * Louis Andriessen: De Materie (Part I), which features an extended solo for two anvils
 * Daniel Auber: opera Le Maçon
 * Arnold Bax: Symphony No. 3
 * The Beatles: "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" makes prominent use of the anvil. Ringo Starr played the anvil.
 * Benjamin Britten: The Burning Fiery Furnace
 * Aaron Copland: Symphony No. 3
 * Don Davis: The Matrix trilogy
 * Fear Factory: "Body Hammer", which features the sound of a hammer striking an anvil as percussion.
 * Brad Fiedel: The Terminator
 * Neil Finn: "Song of the Lonely Mountain," written for the end credits of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
 * Gustav Holst: Second Suite in F for Military Band, which includes a movement titled "Song of the Blacksmith"
 * Nicholas Hooper: ''Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
 * James Horner: Used it extensively in Aliens, and his other films such as Flightplan, The Forgotten and Titanic
 * Jean Michel Jarre: On the overture of the disc "Revolutions".
 * Judas Priest: "Between The Hammer And The Anvil", which features the sound of a hammer striking an anvil for dramatic effect.
 * Kansas: "On the Other Side" featured some use of the anvil. Violinist Robby Steinhardt played the anvil on the track.
 * Carl Orff: Antigone
 * Albert Parlow: "Anvil Polka"
 * Howard Shore: The Lord of the Rings film trilogy
 * Juan María Solare: Veinticinco de agosto, 1983 and Un ángel de hielo y fuego
 * Josef Strauss: Feuerfest!, op. 269 (1869). The title means "fireproof". This was the slogan of the Wertheim fireproof safe company, which commissioned the work.
 * Edgard Varèse: Ionisation
 * Giuseppe Verdi: Il Trovatore, featuring the famous "Anvil Chorus"
 * Richard Wagner: Der Ring des Nibelungen in Das Rheingold in scene 3, using 18 anvils tuned in F in three octaves, and Siegfried in act I, notably Siegfried's "Forging Song" (Nothung! Nothung! Neidliches Schwert!)
 * William Walton: Belshazzar's Feast
 * John Williams: Jaws, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith