EXPERIMENT - Balafon/Marimba keys set up in Hand Pan scale & vaguely similar configuration

I was given a bunch of old Balafon keys while in Senegal recently. The best of them I'm slowly rebuilding into a west African Balafon but having some "extras", I came up with this experiment. The notes are tuned in a common, favorite Hand Pan minor-pentatonic scale and the back-and-forth (right-left-right-left etc) of it's scale, as well as the horizontal low note approximating the "ding" on a Hand Pan, makes something like this immediately familiar & playable by any Hang, Halo or Hand Pan player.

All I can tell you is that the thing is fun to play, sounds good & is not too quiet - even for hand whapping altho simple mallets make it a bit louder & clearer.

As can be seen, this thing is certainly nothing fancy nor is the sound sample, which is intended only to show some possibilities along these line & perhaps spark some ideas.

Balafon & Marimba keys are quite easy to make and tune.

The resonator for this instrument is just the hollow box the keys are sitting atop which at least doubles the volume.

I'll whip up some construction details if I get any interest. Dennis Havlena - dhavlena@gmail.com

My simple musical instrument making webpage is at http://www.DennisHavlena.com

Category:

Music

Tags:

• havlena
• balafon
• hang
• drum
• hank
• halo
• hand
• pan
• marimba
• africa
• dennis

[ksandrproject]

Dennis, its great!

[ksandrproject]

Dennis, its great!

[MrSciencetificsasuke]

very beautiful