Why playing the guitar is really all about sex

{"text":[[{"start":6.5,"text":"With their hollow torsos and long necks, string instruments have long been perceived as an echo of the human silhouette. As early as the 13th century, the Persian poet Rumi compared the lute to the physical body, emphasising that, like the instrument’s hollow cavity, the body must be empty to produce spiritual melodies. But, judging by an upcoming exhibition at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, this resemblance extends far beyond strings."}],[{"start":33.75,"text":"Opening next month, Musical Bodies draws on instruments of all families and vintages: ancient Egyptian clappers chiselled into human hands; mid-20th century Nigerian drums etched with human faces; woodwinds designed to resemble sexual anatomy. Then there is an Aladdin’s cave of string instruments, each more voluptuous than the last, but none more so than the “Violino Harpa Forma Maxima” by 19th-century Czech luthier Thomas Zach — a Dalí-esque viola that encourages us, with its surreal, buttocks-like cheeks, to imagine the performer’s movement."}],[{"start":67.35,"text":"What emerges is a statement on our instinct to carve our own likeness into musical tools — an instinct that, according to the exhibition’s curator, Bradley Strauchen-Scherer, “you find across time, around the world, in high classical art culture, vernacular, popular or folk culture”. The reason? “The simple answer,” she says, “is that since the beginning of time, music has been central to human identity and human activity”."}],[{"start":null,"text":"

• A pair of curved ivory clappers carved to resemble human hands, with incised lines marking the wrists and fingers.
• A violin with an unusual, harp-like body shape featuring three large rounded lobes, made of polished wood with metal fittings.

"}],[{"start":93.19999999999999,"text":"Delving into Darwinian territory, Strauchen-Scherer notes: “Before music became primarily entertainment, it was essential to human survival. We start making sounds with our bodies because we’re hungry, because we need to attract the attention of a parent.” "}],[{"start":109.64999999999999,"text":"Pivotal to this is the relationship between music and sex. “Darwin talked about music as being an evolutionary trait,” Strauchen-Scherer says. “Birds sing beautiful songs to attract a mate. Similarly, we make music to show our accomplishment and attract a partner. Just think of the world of Jane Austen, in which playing an instrument was viewed as a sign of being cultured, and marriageable.”"}],[{"start":131.14999999999998,"text":"This is why, she argues, “nearly every culture has either a flute or a drum in the shape of a penis”. It is also relevant to the sensuality of string instrument design, exemplified by “an extraordinary renaissance lira da braccio, whose front side is carved to represent a male body. But if you flip it over, the back side is very voluptuous. And right over the nether region of the ‘female’ side, there is a moustachioed male face. People have said it’s a bacchanal, it’s an orgy.”"}],[{"start":null,"text":"

• Wooden drum from the Luba people, carved in the form of a female torso with breasts and decorative motifs including a lizard.
• A carved lira da braccio by Giovanni d'Andrea, 1511, featuring a face with a beard and leaf motif on the instrument’s body.

"}],[{"start":159.99999999999997,"text":"She believes such aesthetics affect our listening experience. “My mind immediately races to the world of hardcore guitar playing, sometimes referred to as ‘cock rock’,” she says. “You’ve got these guitars with a voluptuous curved body, very much like the female body, with this long extended neck. And watching someone like Jimi Hendrix — pelvis gyrating, guitar slung low, neck thrust forward — you realise this isn’t just the appearance of sex; it’s the sound of it too.”"}],[{"start":187.19999999999996,"text":"But how much of an instrument’s appearance is purely about aesthetics, and how much is driven by functionality? According to Mimi Waitzman, senior curator of musical collections and cultures at London’s Horniman Museum, musical instruments — like any tool — are shaped to “conform to us and our bodies”, especially because “they are held so intimately”. "}],[{"start":207.99999999999997,"text":"She points out that the theorbo — a giraffe-like lute of the 16th century — required an exceptionally long neck to allow players to provide their own bass accompaniment, much like a keyboard instrument. Similarly, the hourglass shape of a violin — so often compared to the female body — is about more than looks alone: it gives the violinist freedom of movement, preventing the bow from clattering into the sides of the instrument."}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":232.94999999999996,"text":"“Like a kind of marquetry, our body fills the empty space of the instrument, and vice versa,” says Waitzman. Yet, she notes that makers are not impervious to beauty. “And because our system of aesthetic beauty is partly rooted in our being human, we find objects beautiful that reflect human qualities.”"}],[{"start":253.04999999999995,"text":"For Edinburgh-based luthier Steve Burnett, that preoccupation with “human qualities” is central to his craft. A devotee of traditional Italian methods, he admires how master string instrument makers sculpted curves that went far beyond mere functionality. “Matteo Goffriller, the father of the Venice cello, made instruments that were incredibly female and voluptuous in their proportions,” he says. “Likewise Domenico Montagnana . . . made an instrument called ‘the Sleeping Beauty’, which has obvious links to the [idea] of femininity.” Burnett suggests these craftsmen took influence from the female forms of Sandro Botticelli and Leonardo da Vinci: “Think of Botticelli’s Venus: you could easily rest one of those great Venice cellos against [the contours] of her [silhouette].”"}],[{"start":null,"text":""}],[{"start":299.29999999999995,"text":"Burnett believes that we can’t help but personify string instruments, given the particularly human quality of their timbre, which mimics the singing voice. “In many ways the contact between bow and string is the equivalent of feeding air through vocal cords,” he says. This philosophy has fuelled him to create instruments in tribute to historic figures, including Siegfried Sassoon, Wilfred Owen and Ernest Shackleton — in the case of the last of these, using floorboards from the Irish explorer’s house. “As a violin maker, I try and [use my craft] as a way of relating to these figures,” Burnett adds."}],[{"start":335.29999999999995,"text":"But how far can this concept of the anthropomorphic instrument be taken? According to Strauchen-Scherer, straight to its logical extreme. “Often people will come to me with an instrument that was owned by a beloved member of the family and they’ll say something like ‘My husband is in this instrument. There’s a piece of him there’,” she says. “That’s because the act of music-making is so personal and so visceral. You hold instruments in your hands. You pour your emotions and your soul into them. So we start to think of them as people . . . They act as our proxies. They stand in for us and our actions.”"}],[{"start":372.59999999999997,"text":"This brings her to the takeaway message of the Met exhibition: “Nowadays we tend to view music, especially the world of classical music and fine violins, as elitist . . . But the DNA of music is necessity and need. So it shouldn’t be on the margins. It should be front and centre, because it’s for everyone.” "}],[{"start":393.2,"text":"June 7-September 27, metmuseum.org"}],[{"start":397.9,"text":"Find out about our latest stories first — follow FT Weekend on Instagram, Bluesky and X, and sign up to receive the FT Weekend newsletter every Saturday morning"}],[{"start":415.4,"text":""}]],"url":"https://audio.ftcn.net.cn/album/a_1780126899_3023.mp3"}