The intonarumori were Luigi Russolo’s hand-built “noise instruments”, designed to bring the industrial and urban sounds of the modern world into music.
They were created around 1913–1914, after Russolo’s manifesto The Art of Noises, and were intended to expand the sonic palette of music by including the “new” sounds of the machine age—roars, hisses, buzzes, and clanks.
Each intonarumori was a wooden box with a mechanical crank, internal resonators, and an acoustic horn that amplified the sound.
Russolo categorized noises into families, such as Roars (rombi); Whistles (sibili); Crackles (crepitii); Hisses (stropicciamenti); Explosions (scoppi). Each instrument was designed to generate variations of these textures, allowing performers to “play” noise as one would a violin or organ.
The first concerts using these,(1914, Milan), caused uproar—some audiences rioted, others were fascinated. Russolo and his colleague Ugo Piatti toured with the instruments, performing Futurist works. Though World War I interrupted their activities, later performances in Paris attracted avant-garde composers and artists.
Most original intonarumori were destroyed during World War II or lost. Reconstructions have been built since the 1970s, allowing modern audiences to hear Russolo’s vision. They influenced experimental, noise, and industrial music, foreshadowing musique concrète, electroacoustic composition, and even punk and avant-garde rock.