Amongst all the variables of pitch, contexts and aesthetics, the one constant we might expect to find in a history of the falsetto voice is the instrument itself. The larynx, and human body that houses it, may differ from individual to individual, but the tendency has been to assume that it has not differed from age to age. Glance at the image of any male singer in history, and structurally they look similar to us. If so, then presumably their larynxes are also fundamentally similar.

A violinist would make no such assumptions about his own instrument. By way of illustration, when Corelli reputedly demanded of his pupils that they be able to sustain a forte for ten seconds with a single double-stopped down-bow he was, as any aspiring Baroque violinist knows, making a supreme challenge to their technique. That such a demand should seem relatively unremarkable to the same player on a modern violin neatly underlines a truth which the early instrumental world has long taken for granted: namely, that to appreciate the peculiar demands made during any one period in the evolution of musical style, we must also look at the parallel evolution of instrumental technology.