Hornbostel–Sachs

Summary

Hornbostel–Sachs or Sachs–Hornbostel is a system of musical instrument classification devised by Erich Moritz von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs. This system was first published in the Zeitschrift für Ethnologie in 1914. An English translation was published in the Galpin Society Journal in 1961, which is the most widely used system for classifying musical instruments by ethnomusicologists and organologists. The system was updated in 2011 as part of the work of the Musical Instrument Museums Online (MIMO) Project.