Listen to the celesta
Tip: press play to see the sound's live frequency spectrum in blue over the waveform.
How the celesta makes its sound
In the Hornbostel–Sachs system, which classifies instruments by how they produce sound, the celesta belongs to the struck idiophones: the body is struck directly – bells, gongs, xylophones and cymbals.
More broadly it is one of the idiophones, where the solid body of the instrument itself vibrates, without strings or a stretched membrane.
Its timbre – the colour that lets you tell it apart from other instruments playing the same note – comes from the mix of overtones its body and resonator emphasise.
From Wikipedia
The celesta or celeste, also called a bell-piano, is a struck idiophone operated by a keyboard. It looks similar to a four- or five-octave upright piano, albeit with smaller keys and a much smaller cabinet, or a large wooden music box (three-octave). The keys connect to hammers that strike a graduated set of metal (usually steel) plates or bars suspended over wooden resonators. Four- or five-octave models usually have a damper pedal that sustains or damps the sound. The three-octave instruments do not have a pedal because of their small "table-top" design. One of the best-known works that uses the celesta is Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's "Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" from The Nutcracker.
Other struck idiophones
Frequently asked questions
What does a celesta sound like?
Listen to 2 recordings on this page. As one of the struck idiophones, its sound comes from the way the body is struck directly.
What type of instrument is the celesta?
It is classified as struck idiophones (Hornbostel–Sachs 111.222).
Sources & credits
- Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies (ISRC USUAN1100270) by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky / Kevin MacLeod – CC BY 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Cascading arpeggios on celesta from Sugar Plum Fairy by Tchaikovsky – Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
- Wikidata Q320341 – CC0
- Wikipedia: Celesta – CC BY-SA 4.0
- Image – GFDL 1.2