Talk:Mark tree

Name

Google "bell chimes" Google "mark tree" one important hit

I'd never heard the name mark tree before seeing it in Wikipedia, although I've heard them live quite often and seen them in music shops.

(But never tempted to buy. Frankly I don't particularly like the effect, I've always thought they detracted from the performance but then the drummers I've heard use them haven't had a lot to offer anyway. Sorry if that's harsh!)

Anyway, the name does have some currency, apparently. (And the manner in which I've seen them used is evidently the way they're meant to be played, as a sort of tuned instrument used in an untuned manner. To each their own.) Andrewa (talk) 20:17, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Two standard percussion history texts: Jame Holland's Percussion (Schirmer Reference, 1981) and James Blades Percussion Instruments and Their History (Farber & Farber, 1984) -- refer to this instrument as a "Mark Tree".

I've also heard them called "nail trees", "bar chimes", "bell trees" (incorrectly), and "wind chimes" (incorrectly). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.95.43.253 (talk) 22:36, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

"Bar chimes" have been around for at least a century; the "mark tree" is very similar but has solid chimes instead of hollow ones, and was invented in the 1960s. They make about the same sound. These instruments used to have two separate articles; information has been lost by combining them into one and conflating two different things. 173.174.85.204 (talk) 16:25, 1 February 2016 (UTC)Eric

Image

One is badly needed. Anyone got a set to photograph and put on commons? Andrewa (talk) 22:11, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Wind chimes

Um . . .

Wind chimes are mounted in a circle with a hanging striker strung in the center; they may be solid or hollow and made of many types of material, whereas the mark tree is mounted in a linear fashion and normally has solid metal bars.

The chief distinction between the Mark tree and wind chimes has to do with how they're activated, not what shape they are. Some wind chimes are mounted in a circle, but I have wind chimes that are mounted in squares, ovals, triangles, hexagons, random bunches, and also linearly. There are also Mark trees made with various kinds of wood, metal, and even glass rods.

The primary distinction is: Mark trees are intended to be activated by hand (or a percussion mallet), whereas wind chimes are intended to be activated by the blowing of the wind.

Proposed name change

I recently happened upon a vintage example of this instrument at an estate sale, and purchased it to give to my brother, who is in his 60s, and a percussionist with a symphony orchestra (and a Berklee grad). I knew what it did and in what contexts it was used, but not the name for it. When I gave it to him I asked him what it was called. He answered "It's a bar chimes". Returning to Wikipedia, I looked up that term and found this page, through a redirect, but was perplexed by the name given here. I called him to ask if it was also called a "Mark tree" and his answer was "What's a 'Mark tree?!'" I then Googled "Mark tree" + "percussion OR instrument OR music", and this resulted in 30,000 hits. I changed the first term to "bar chimes" and this time the result was 125,000 hits; more than four times as many results. The instrument in question bears no resemblance to a tree, and Mark Stevens is so obscure that he doesn't even warrant a Wiki article. I think that it's safe to say that no one can find this page intuitively by trying to use keywords that would come to the mind of the layperson, but the resemblance to other kinds of commonly-known "chimes" (including wind chimes) is intuitive, and "bar" is descriptive, since they are made from bars of metal. I suggest that the article be changed to the more descriptive, intuitive and commonly-known term "bar chimes". Bricology (talk) 23:56, 27 August 2024 (UTC)

"Mark tree" is the preferred term by most scholarly books actually written about percussion: How to Write for Percussion (p. 168); A Dictionary for the Modern Percussionist and Drummer (p. 118); All about Hand Percussion (p. 24); Percussion for Musicians (p. 41); Practical Percussion: A Guide to the Instruments and Their Sources (p. 35)... I could go on, but you get the point. Most of the entries in the books above start off with: "Mark tree" (also known as...). Some do not even have the term "bar chimes" listed, using other common terms such as "bar tree" or "chime tree". Why? I Ask (talk) 04:33, 28 August 2024 (UTC)

WP isn't a industry organ for professional percussionists. Technical jargon found in "scholarly books" is not the litmus test of what something should be called on WP; public understanding is the test. And as I pointed out, "bar chimes" produces more than 4 times the results that "mark tree" does in a Google search; a very good indication of the public's relative familiarity with those terms. "Mark tree" is counter-intuitive; no layperson knows who or what "Mark" is or was, and the object in no way resembles a tree. It does however, fall into the idiophonic family of chimes, and the shapes are those of bars. QED.
Bricology (talk) 23:03, 23 October 2024 (UTC)

Cool, but when every source on percussion, from Oxford Dictionaries to general music books to specialist percussion books, your point matters little. Not to mention, bar chimes can refer to a couple entirely different instruments (e.g., this). Why? I Ask (talk) 01:38, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

In fact, that source you provided proves my point rather than yours. First, because the specific page you cited never actually describes that 3-tube arrangement as a "bar chimes"; it calls it a "Hand-Held Chime". And second, under the category "chimes" (https://www.steveweissmusic.com/category/symphonic-chimes) it displays about 20 racks with tubes of graduated lengths hanging from them ("tubular bells") in the same arrangement as the "bar chimes" I have been describing, reinforcing the fact that the instrument in question is commonly known even among professional musical instrument makers as "chimes", rather than as "trees".
Here's the page on the Steve Weiss Music site you linked to that actually offers the instrument in question. Do they call them "Mark trees"? Nope, they call them "chimes": https://www.steveweissmusic.com/category/treeworks-chimes
Here's Meinl Percussion, one of the world's most prestigious makers of percussion instruments, with their offerings of the instrument in question. Guess what they call them. "Bar chimes". The word "mark" doesn't exist on their website: https://meinlpercussion.com/en/instruments/filter/Chimes-f10504.html
Here's Adams Percussion, another of the world's biggest makers -- "bar chimes", not "Mark trees": https://www.adams-music.com/en/percussion/barchimes
Here's LP (Latin Percussion), another of the world's largest makers of percussion instruments. "Mark trees" here? No, "bar chimes": https://www.lpmusic.com/percussion/bar-chimes/
Here's Sabian, another major maker. "Mark trees"? Again, no: "bar chimes". https://sabian.com/product/61174b-24-bar-chimes-bronze/
Here's RhythmTech's offerings -- again, "bar chimes", not "Mark trees": https://www.rhythmtech.com/product/bar-chimes-double-row/
Here's TreeWorks -- apparently one of the most highly-respected manufacturers of these instruments, who calls them "bar chimes", not "Mark trees". https://www.schlagwerk.com/en/products/tuned-percussion/treeworks/
So the fact is that when the very manufacturers of these instruments want customers to be able to search for and find them, so that they can remain in business and prosper, they don't call them "Mark trees"; they call them "bar chimes". And what the manufacturers who create the instruments, and their customers (i.e., the public) know them as is far more relevant to the title of a WP article than the obscure jargon that one might find in some textbook.
Bricology (talk) 19:22, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

Yeah, because Mark tree is a trademarked name by SpectraSound. But it was the first, and it is what all actual sources, not just manufacturers, use. WP:COMMON is pretty clear that the article name should be determined by its prevalence in a significant majority of independent, reliable, English-language sources. I can list no less than ten of these sources. This will be my last comment. If you want to change it, start a move discussion and get others to "chime" in. Why? I Ask (talk) 20:49, 24 October 2024 (UTC)

"Yeah, because Mark tree is a trademarked name by SpectraSound.
So to be clear: you are advocating for a WP article being named after a trade name -- a trade name which happens to be in uncommon parlance among the majority of WP visitors, instead of after the more broadly-used generic, descriptive term. That's a curious tactic. You might want to see how WP treats Kleenex as a sub-category of facial tissues. As every Kleenex is a facial tissue, but far from all facial tissues are made by Kleenex, every "Mark tree" is a bar chime, but far from all bar chimes are "Mark trees". Imagine claiming that since the Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz-Tone was the first commercially-available distortion pedal, that the article on distortion pedals must be titled "Maestro FZ-1 Fuzz-Tone"! That would not fly, for obvious reasons: one is a trade-named product, the other is a broader type of product that the former belongs within.
Want to start a new article on "Mark trees™", the product from SpectraSound (a company so obscure as to not even have a WP article of its own)? Go right ahead. In the meantime, the generic term is "bar chimes", as I have amply demonstrated from both overwhelming Google search results, and every other percussion instrument manufacturer on earth, apparently. And for every published source you might be able to provide for "Mark tree™", I can provide at least as many citations from non-SpectraSound sources to show that the more broadly-used, generic term is "bar chimes", and thus this article should be named, for the sake of being discoverable by WP users, rather than as some kind of vanity naming after a non-notable person named "Mark", produced by a non-notable brand, and incorporating the nonsensical form of a "tree".
Bricology (talk) 03:06, 25 October 2024 (UTC)