| T O P I C R E V I E W |
| Lily M Green |
Posted - 03 Oct 2010 : 15:09:25
Forgive me if there is a really obvious answer to this question. I've had a search of the forums, an nosey at the compendium and a general google and I can't seem to locate a full list of musical instruments available to the bards and musicians of The Realms. Does such a beast exist, if so where would I find it? I did notice a list of songs.
Similarly is there a guide to food and drink (I spotted a drinks one in the compendium section I believe). I guess what I am looking for is what you could describe a minutiae of the Realms guide.
Thank you, dears! |
| 30 L A T E S T R E P L I E S (Newest First) |
| Sightless |
Posted - 03 May 2012 : 23:40:16
quote:
Originally posted by Cassie5squared
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
Further....quote:
Originally printed in Horselords, by David Cook, pg.125
Drifting through the night came the wail of a band of musicians, the scraping notes of the khuur and rhythmic rattle of a yak-hide drum. A singer suddenly added to the cacophony, wailing in the two-voice style peculiar to the steppe. Somehow the man produced both a low, nasal drone and a high-pitched chant at the same time.
It goes on to say that Tuigan music is an acquired taste. Not sure if the strange ability of the kaychi to sing in two voices is paranormal, or just some extremely difficult skill to master (along the lines of ventriloquism).
The Yak-Hide drums are fairly common, and are also used to give signals in war (that part is covered in Dragonwall).
The singing in two voices at once sounds to me much like Mongolian throat singing, and thus a skill one does not need any kind of paranormality to master.
Just thought I'd toss that out there. 
that, or Zhing Chinese Opera. |
| Sarelle |
Posted - 03 May 2012 : 22:22:48
Ah, not to worry. I'm having my carpets replaced so the next session with my players has been delayed a week, giving me more time to research proper Realmsian flavour for the bard. Whenever you get the chance I eagerly await your notes! |
| The Sage |
Posted - 23 Apr 2012 : 15:08:04
quote:
Originally posted by Sarelle
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Sarelle
This actually just came up in the Realms campaign I'm running at the moment, and I wanted to be comprehensive what instruments I can suggest.
Do you still have that list you mentioned, Sage and might you be willing to share it with me? I'd be ever so grateful!
I can certainly share it, of course. 
But I don't have it with me presently. And I won't be near it again until the weekend. So I'll leave this window open on my desktop as a reminder for myself.
Ooh, great, thanks! Hopefully my players will appreciate the thoroughness!
I haven't forgotten your request, Sarelle. Nor your request either, Alystra.
It's just that I didn't have the desired opportunity to access the relevant archive over the weekend, as I'd initially planned. I'll try and track down the material again come this weekend. |
| Cassie5squared |
Posted - 23 Apr 2012 : 14:39:30
quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
Further....quote:
Originally printed in Horselords, by David Cook, pg.125
Drifting through the night came the wail of a band of musicians, the scraping notes of the khuur and rhythmic rattle of a yak-hide drum. A singer suddenly added to the cacophony, wailing in the two-voice style peculiar to the steppe. Somehow the man produced both a low, nasal drone and a high-pitched chant at the same time.
It goes on to say that Tuigan music is an acquired taste. Not sure if the strange ability of the kaychi to sing in two voices is paranormal, or just some extremely difficult skill to master (along the lines of ventriloquism).
The Yak-Hide drums are fairly common, and are also used to give signals in war (that part is covered in Dragonwall).
The singing in two voices at once sounds to me much like Mongolian throat singing, and thus a skill one does not need any kind of paranormality to master.
Just thought I'd toss that out there. |
| Sarelle |
Posted - 21 Apr 2012 : 09:34:42
quote:
Originally posted by The Sage
quote:
Originally posted by Sarelle
This actually just came up in the Realms campaign I'm running at the moment, and I wanted to be comprehensive what instruments I can suggest.
Do you still have that list you mentioned, Sage and might you be willing to share it with me? I'd be ever so grateful!
I can certainly share it, of course.
But I don't have it with me presently. And I won't be near it again until the weekend. So I'll leave this window open on my desktop as a reminder for myself.
Ooh, great, thanks! Hopefully my players will appreciate the thoroughness! |
| The Sage |
Posted - 18 Apr 2012 : 01:15:50
quote:
Originally posted by Alystra Illianniis
Please pass it along! I've got most of the books, but for the life of me, don't recall any mention of such, and I'm missing one or two of them.
Recalling what little I have in my notes, they're just bits and pieces about how drow music sounds, and a few glimpses of the strange way their music is often produced. Most of these bits came from the WotSQ books. I didn't find much in any of the Drizzt-related novels about drow music that wasn't already covered, sparingly, elsewhere. |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 18 Apr 2012 : 01:06:07
Please pass it along! I've got most of the books, but for the life of me, don't recall any mention of such, and I'm missing one or two of them. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 18 Apr 2012 : 01:04:51
quote:
Originally posted by Alystra Illianniis
I'll be waiting for the weekend, then! And perhaps I will ask Ed about underdark instruments, as well.
I've got some tidbits on Underdark musical instruments. Not much, though. Just bits gleaned from books like the "War of the Spider Queen" series and stuff. |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 17 Apr 2012 : 23:20:33
I'll be waiting for the weekend, then! And perhaps I will ask Ed about underdark instruments, as well.
|
| The Sage |
Posted - 17 Apr 2012 : 03:14:20
quote:
Originally posted by Sarelle
This actually just came up in the Realms campaign I'm running at the moment, and I wanted to be comprehensive what instruments I can suggest.
Do you still have that list you mentioned, Sage and might you be willing to share it with me? I'd be ever so grateful!
I can certainly share it, of course.
But I don't have it with me presently. And I won't be near it again until the weekend. So I'll leave this window open on my desktop as a reminder for myself.
|
| Sarelle |
Posted - 16 Apr 2012 : 17:11:00
This actually just came up in the Realms campaign I'm running at the moment, and I wanted to be comprehensive what instruments I can suggest.
Do you still have that list you mentioned, Sage and might you be willing to share it with me? I'd be ever so grateful! |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 30 Nov 2010 : 07:01:40
Oh, now that's just SWEET!! I can totally see a bardic college doing something like this, too!! Hmmm, maybe under a study of "natural" music? There was a great scene with these in the Disney movie "Sorcerer's Apprentice" this year!! |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 29 Nov 2010 : 14:22:17
Back on topic ...
Thayan Thunder coils! Yes, even more exciting (and louder) than the zulkoon
[Edit: Note the chainmail suit, worn for electrical safety reasons. Music starts about 40 seconds in.]
I also found a strange gnome playing a Thayan Theramin. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 26 Nov 2010 : 04:17:02
Drifting, ever drifting, slightly away from topic ...
I've been shopping for an Yamaha Electone (a type of mastercraft Zulkoon organ-like instrument), and discovered some performances by this astonishing young bard - the most recognized music perhaps being Pirates of the Caribbean, Indiana Jones, and Star Wars - not really Realmslore, true ... although she does (inexplicably) wear a dragon custume at times. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 24 Nov 2010 : 09:38:51
lmao - this scroll, yesterday.
No worries, I'll wait a moon or two if needed. 'Twas meant to be a joke. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 24 Nov 2010 : 09:22:36
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
(Remind me to remind you to post your time travel links, Sage, in about a month.)
Embarassingly, I'll admit I'm drawing a blank on this one. Can you point me to the specific scroll I made this statement in? |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 24 Nov 2010 : 08:43:26
(Remind me to remind you to post your time travel links, Sage, in about a month.) |
| The Sage |
Posted - 24 Nov 2010 : 08:36:57
Yes, now that you've reminded me.
...
Seriously, did you really expect anything less? |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 24 Nov 2010 : 07:31:02
Any luck on that list yet, Sage? |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 22 Oct 2010 : 14:13:40
Vance's style is very distinctive, if somewhat dated today. His writing was certainly influential in shaping the earliest D&D rules.
You might like the style of the fantasy writers who influenced him - Tolkien, Mervyn Peake, Roger Zelazny; or even, of course, the legendary Lovecraft.
Or Vance's contemporaries - Steven Donaldson, Michael Moorcock, Gene Wolff, Robert Silverberg. Just to name a few.
Most of these older (pre-1980s) fantasy books are a bit hard to come by today. They tend to be richly described and immersive, as opposed to some of the modern fantasy lore which is squarely aimed at hollywood action-pulp bookselling. Before the condemning flames of hellfire rage forth, I'd like to point out the there are many exceptions to what I've said (in and out of the Realms) and bestseller-pulp books of today are not better and not worse than the more "serious" fantasy genre of yesterlore. Both are acquired tastes. |
| xaviera |
Posted - 22 Oct 2010 : 06:43:44
quote:
Originally posted by Arik
I can already imagine my sinister Red Wizard toiling in the sour smoke-filled dimness of his bubbling alchemical laboratory, cackling with feverish inspiration as he works his unspeakably foul experiments at the alembic ... his wildly animated rotting undead minion playing frantically powerful scores at the many complex levers of a Zulkoon. Mwoohahahaahaaa!
I suggest also that revel of the deceased, When the Night Wind Howls
---
I mentioned Jack Vance earlier - let me quote some fragments from the description of a performance in his "The Brave Free Men",
Etzwane took up the gastaing: an instrument of deeper tone than the khitan, with a plangent resonance which must remain under the control of the damping sleeve if the harmony were not to be overwhelmed. Unlike many musicians, Etzwane enjoyed the gastaing and the subtleties to be achieved by expert tilting and sliding of the sleeve.
He took Frolitz's khitan, struck a chord, bent the neck, tested the scratch-box.
Frolitz and Mielke on the clarion played ground notes, careful to stay harmonically aside, with the guizol and gastaing striking unobtrusive accents.
He nodded to Frolitz, who now in his turn blew a theme into the mouth-cup of his wood-horn -- a gasping rasping sardonic statement foreign to the fluid clarity of the instrument, which Dystar emphasized with harsh slow strokes of the scratch-box, and the music was off and away: a polyphony melancholy and deliberate, in which every instrument of the troupe could clearly be heard. Dystar played calmly, his invention every instant opening new perspectives into the music... The melody broke and faltered, in a manner anticipated by all; Dystar struck out an astounding exercise, starting in the upper register, working down through a perplexing combination of chords, with only an occasional resonance of the gastaing for support; down through upper-middle and lower-middle registers, backwards and forwards, like a falling leaf; this way and that, into the lower tones, to finish with a guttural elbow at the scratch-box. On the wood-horn Frolitz blew a quaver a minor interval below, which dwindled and died into the resonance of the gastaing.
He played slow chords, quickly damped, creating a pattern of sound and silence, which became interesting to him, and which he restated in an inversion. Resisting the tempation to embellish, he played a spare stately music. The troupe supplied ground notes, which presently became a broad theme, swelling up like a wave over the khitan, then subsiding. Etzwane played a set of clanging disharmonic chords and a soft resolution; the music ended.
Vance is amazing with words and descriptions, and pretty much any of his books will provide ideas for campaigns.
|
| Dennis |
Posted - 20 Oct 2010 : 08:38:55
I wish I were.
My dad plays musical instruments pretty good, and he and my mom sing excellently. And I? Well, zilch! Sometimes I wonder if I was adopted.
Whenever I sing, I could imagine the sky literally rupturing! |
| The Sage |
Posted - 20 Oct 2010 : 08:13:26
quote:
Originally posted by dennis
And I never thought the 'Keep is rife with music geeks.
Heh. I was a music-geek long before I became a geek of anything else, in fact. |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 20 Oct 2010 : 07:20:27
To quote my favorite real-life bard, Dan the Bard- "This one time, at bard camp..." (It's a line from one of his songs. No, really.) |
| Dennis |
Posted - 20 Oct 2010 : 07:16:26
And I never thought the 'Keep is rife with music geeks. |
| Ayrik |
Posted - 18 Oct 2010 : 07:05:17
The Zulkoon is absolutely perfect!
I can already imagine my sinister Red Wizard toiling in the sour smoke-filled dimness of his bubbling alchemical laboratory, cackling with feverish inspiration as he works his unspeakably foul experiments at the alembic ... his wildly animated rotting undead minion playing frantically powerful scores at the many complex levers of a Zulkoon. Mwoohahahaahaaa!
Suggested thematic pieces ...
Atrum Selūna ("Dark Moon"), Necromancer's Door, Despair (in the Scarlet Darkness), Red Flames of Death and Atrum Bane Cometes ("Dark Lord Cometh"), Madness in the Castle, Movements of the Bones, Spell of Unspoken Words from the infamous two-part Zulkoonar's Sinistro (aka Son of Zulkoonstein); the celebrated Dead Three Overture; the little known Groke Nocturne (aka Rashamen's Eve or Sleeping Ghosts of the Underdark); and of course the much expected evil mad wizard classic Gothic Sembian Toccata & Fugue Plane (in D minor).
Or, when feeling a little "Impish" after sniffing a few too many brimstone fumes ...
A more lively and whimsical piece, perhaps Flight of the Dragonbee (why not, eh?); Beholder of Darkness; or the demented Haunted Manshoon (aka The Grim Grinning Graveyard Dance).
(The latter not to be confused with the all-time Thayvian children's favourite, Dance of the Mortals.) |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 18 Oct 2010 : 02:45:00
Well, I'd ask him, but we all know about "Sage Time". No telling how long it'd take for an answer, lol! |
| Alystra Illianniis |
Posted - 18 Oct 2010 : 02:24:54
Ooh, thanks! I'd almost forgotten about that! Please do, good sir. |
| The Sage |
Posted - 18 Oct 2010 : 01:51:07
quote:
Originally posted by Alystra Illianniis
What about Underdark instruments? The only ones I've really come across were in some D&D core supplement books, like the Arms and Equipment Guide, and an article on Drow life in Dragon # 298 that mentioned a complex lute-like instrument with up to sixty-four strings (don't ask me how they all fit on it) called a vazhan-do. Does Ed have any other Underdakr intruments?
You could ask him. I've got one or two notes on drow-specific musical instruments mentioned in the "War of the Spider Queen" books, so I'll dig those out as well.
|
| The Sage |
Posted - 18 Oct 2010 : 01:48:56
quote:
Originally posted by Ionik Knight
The FRCS makes specific mention of the Zulkoon "a complex and semi-portable organ" used by the zulkirs of Thay.
I'll note also that the zulkoon is popular in Selgaunt -- where musicians skilled in the production of music from this instrument, reside. |
|
|
