Arpeggione

The arpeggione is a member of the lutes (Hornbostel–Sachs 321.322-71). Its invention is credited to Johann Georg Stauffer. Learn how it makes its sound and explore related instruments.

How the arpeggione makes its sound

In the Hornbostel–Sachs system, which classifies instruments by how they produce sound, the arpeggione belongs to the lutes: strings run parallel to a soundboard and along a neck – the family of the guitar, violin, sitar and oud.

More broadly it is one of the chordophones (string instruments), where sound comes from vibrating strings, amplified by a resonating body.

Press play above and watch the spectrum: the evenly spaced peaks are harmonics, and their relative strength is what gives the instrument its character.

From Wikipedia

The arpeggione is a six-stringed musical instrument fretted and tuned like a guitar, but with a curved bridge so it can be bowed like a cello, and thus similar to the bass viola da gamba. The instrument is sometimes also called a guitar violoncello. It is essentially a bass viol with a guitar-type tuning, E–A–d–g–b–e'. The body shape of the arpeggione is, however, more similar to a medieval fiddle than either the guitar or the bass viol. The arpeggione is especially suited to playing runs in thirds, double stops, and arpeggios.

It enjoyed a brief period of popularity for perhaps a decade after its invention around 1823 by the Viennese instrument luthiers Johann Georg Stauffer and Peter Teufelsdorfer. The only notable extant piece for the arpeggione is a sonata with piano accompaniment by Franz Schubert, D.821, published in 1871, when the instrument was long out of vogue. The sonata is now usually played on the cello or viola and has been transcribed for other instruments.