Odd percussion instruments

Subject: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Walking Eagle
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 04:57 PM

Jack Ashford, one time percussionist for Motown, once played a hotel bed sheet by snapping it on some Motown tunes.

What's the oddest percussion instrument that you have played? I once played a paperbag containing marbles.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Jeanie
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 05:46 PM

My dad, sadly no longer with us, used to regularly play the stem of his pipe against his teeth and his metal pipe-cleaner on his tobacco tin. His favourite was "Bye Bye Blues" - and a very good job he made of it, too !

- jeanie

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Mr Red
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 05:49 PM

I remember a session where someone played a morris tune and somehow all the non-players where asked to get out their keys (no ash-trays were hurt in the making of this music). The keys were held up and jingled in time to the music. And everyone fell about in inebriated laughing. Very realistic it was too.
I have yet to find any red spoon BUT I found some plastic salad servers and they do make a pleasant enough sound.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: open mike
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 06:25 PM

if making music in the kitchen,
a wide mouthed canning jar is a
good rhythm maker--add some water
for interesting sound effects...
also i have made a great train sound
by playing my bodhran with a Kush toy-
which is like a bunch of rubber bands
bundled together. kush toys look like pom-
poms...

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: CraigS
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 06:52 PM

Will Hall uses a bodhran tipper on his concertina case - says it's easier than carrying a bodhran.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: NH Dave
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 07:36 PM

I believe Blue Man Crew plays on sections of PVC drain pipe, many with one end blocked to make them sound lower, and often with a slider over the open end, like a trombone. This makes an interesting, tunable, instrument.


Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 01 Dec 02 - 10:42 PM

NH Dave is right. The Blue Man Group does play a xylophone made from PVC pipes. I've seen a library book which tells how to make it. I have a feeling this book is widely available.

2. One year I wanted to get the sound of a snare drum for a song at the Highland games. I experimented and decided the best effect comes from laying uncooked linguine inside a shallow drum such as a bodhran. You hold it horizontally and upside down, of course.

3. Cottonwood branches often produce a sonorous tone when struck. I made a drum by supporting good branches on lengths of 1-by and hitting them with spoons.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Boab
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 02:40 AM

Ten inch square three quarter inch thick laminate board a la bodhran rim. Twelve inch wooden school ruler on the bottom teeth [I used to drive my language teacher crazy with "Sur le Pont D'Avignon".]Kitchen knives on any damn' thing. Two empty beer bottles rattling off each other. The bowl of my old briar pipe on the table top. Two beer mats [very effective!]

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: PeteBoom
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:00 AM

Ahem... including but not limited to:

3 sizes of paper bags, opened, closed, struck with fingers, pencils, ball-point pens (biros), flicked with water, wrinkled and unwrinkled;

A stack of folding chairs (pushed down a stair-well);

Music stands (the big heavy, black types used by orchestras, etc.,), played with drum sticks, rattans, marimba mallets, nails (of varying sizes), screws (of varying sizes) and car keys;

A brake drum.

Cheers -

Pete

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: greg stephens
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:51 AM

Two matchboxes (sandpaper to sandpaper) make a nice effect at sessions. And you can use the contents for setting fire to bodhrans and piano-accordions as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 10:02 AM

Plastic cassette-tape case filled with dry beans and covered with contact paper.

Gold-foil cardboard tube with metal top (empty liturgical incense container), filled with rice I think... it's been awhile since I made a bunch of these with oatmeal, rice, beans, and so forth, using Pringle's cans and anything else available.

Oh yeah, and wooden ice cream spoons (remmber those?), some with rows of tiny sleighbells wired on and some drilled and put together in 3's with elastic to make a clacking/snapping thingie on a little handle.

Cheap and not TOO loud fun for kids at singalongs.

More seriously, a wooden cooking spoon and iced tea spoons, with which I hammer my autoharp. Dulcimer hammers are just not heavy enough.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Mooh
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 10:09 AM

Jeanie...My Dad did the same thing with his pipe against his teeth, I think subconsciously. I wonder if it's common among pipe smokers.

Recording sessions sometimes turn up some weird percussion things. Drum sounds can be hard to fine tune, so we once ended up with a piano stool covered in (I think) a cloth instead of a snare drum. Trouble was the drummer had to reposition the cloth throughout the recording while he played, without loosing the beat. He was brilliant.

We once had trouble getting the right bodhran sound so I ended up playing it between my knees with my hands, bongo style. Muting with alternate hands took some otherworldly concentration, but the sound was there.

We used to play Shule-a-roo (please forgive the spelling) with shaker, drum, guitar scratches, and best of all a tamborine rigged to the end of a stick the other end of which was beat on the floor. Two sounds in one from the stick rig.

Peace, Mooh.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Claymore
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 02:22 PM

Actually you are all in for a treat; introducing the Bottlehran. It is the current rage in the Cultural Hub of the Western World, (Shepherdstown, WV, natch!).

Get a plastic water bottle, the type that are now used to service your standard water cooler. Bring your chromatic tuner, and strike the side of the empty water bottle with a well padded tipper (more on this later). You will find that with the right water bottle, they will give off a low note (I now have E, F, and C# bottles, but the Holy Grail is an A bottle, or failing that, a D or G). The right bottle has a wonderful drone note, which will remind you of the wet rim of a large bowel or a very clear diggerydo.

You hold the neck of the bottle in your left hand (they are quite light) and strike the side in bodhran fashion. You cannot really do the two headed tipper bit and most regulr tippers sound like s--- anyway. Get a regular drum stick (or dowel) and cut the thumb out of a cotton (not leather) glove. Cut a strip of sponge about 3/4 of an inch wide and 3 inches long. Fold it over the top of the drum stick and cover it with the glove thumb. Tie off the loose end of the glove thumb by winding it with heavy tread or light wire. You now have a soft end with which to stike the bottle in bodhran fashion. It helps to use plain spray household furniture wax on the side of the bottle, and the drum stick tip, to reduce the friction. This increases the hum as well as the deep bell-like tone.

I'm now using the F bottle on the Xmas tune "Little Drummer Boy" as well as the "Campbells are Coming", and the E on "Morrisons Jig" and "Swallowtail". I have also used it with a Tabor pipe in some French Renaissance music.

I have a friend of mine who is a private pilot. He is now holding a tuner, and tapping empty water bottles in every small airport he lands at...

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Kim C
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 02:59 PM

Too Slim from Riders in the Sky plays his face.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Walking Eagle
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 05:23 PM

Interesting bit about using PVC pipe. I've seen some didgeridoos (sp?)made out of PVC.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Claymore
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 06:06 PM

Having reread my post, please change the word "bowel" to "bowl".

I'm sure there are percussion instruments which may sound like the "wet rim of a large bowel", but I'm not sure I would want to hear it...

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 06:27 PM

But bowel read so much better, as I read Hardi your post! Esxpecially since he's got the poopy flu right now!

Add water for pitch variety then?

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Claymore
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 06:44 PM

No, I tried water but it reduces the resonance. The sound does not come from the difference in the volumn of air, but from the resonance of the side of the bottle. The three bottles I do have, difer only in the thickness of the walls, and the number of rings on the sides. I know this sounds crazy, but you actually have to hear it to understand... Think of something that goes OMMMMMM as you strike it, but again, only with a rather soft tipper.

And it sounds like Hardi is on the Claymore 12 Step Program... you must stay within 12 steps of the toilet at all times... Good Luck!

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 07:04 PM

My bodhrani friend Carol has a bodhran-sized piece of Masonite that's primary function is to protect her bodhran's head while in its case. If more than a couple of bodhrans show up for a session she'll put her drum up and just play the piece of Masonite instead.

Bruce

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,JennyO
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 08:03 PM

There's a guy here in Sydney called Mick Griffin who makes tunable didges by putting a piece of PVC pipe inside another slightly larger piece and sliding it up and down like a trombone. Personally, I like to play my tummy with my fingers - it makes a very satisfying slapping sound, rather like hitting two fish together. It's also quite close to the bowel, and there might be some variation in sound, depending on how much I have eaten (or drunk).You can add beer or wine, or Jameson's for pitch variety, too. Organ recitals are another matter entirely.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 08:30 PM

Claymore, Hardi also taught munitions in ROTC, and "Claymore" as a program title seems, to him, raucously appropriate....

We thought he simply took too much of that fine over-the-counter preparation, VaVoomm, but the thermometeer tells a different story!

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:20 PM

From Santiago de Compostela: two scallop shells ( the symbol of St James -Sant Iago -) Hold one in left hand and run the rim of the other against it plus chink-chink in between: very effective, but when you use new shells expect bits to come flying off like dandruff everywhere!
I also remember doing Britten's "Noye's Fludde" at school: we all had to take teacups in which were then tested for pitch, and the suitable ones strung up in a line and gently struck to represent raindrops.
WYSIWYG: I have the Scottish version of your shaker: a tube which originally housed shortbreads. I hit it too hard in a session last summer and the sellotape holding the top on popped off and everyone got showered with rice!
Tattie B

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: wysiwyg
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:25 PM

TB-- TAPE, always use TAPE.

*G*

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:28 PM

A friend tells of a musician he met in Mexico who bills himself as "Sir Rocksalot". He plays, you guessed it, rocks. Apparently makes a pretty decent living at it.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Richard H
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:41 PM

Mooh mentioned a "shule-a -roo". A musicologist from Maine gave me a weird percussion device of similar description. It's a tallish stick with symbols at the top, wood block, cow-bell and streamers attached. There's a spring at the bottom where you bang it on the ground - it probably could double as a pogo stick if you were caught in traffic and late for a gig.

There is also a wire running down one side where you're supposed to put an inflated pig's bladder.

I mentioned it on another site and someone did know the name but I forget what it was.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: michaelr
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 09:55 PM

I've recorded an empty sheetmetal chassis with hardware that's sort of loose in it; it makes a long-decaying metallic buzz/rattle sound.

I've also recorded myself rhythmically rubbing the threads of two long machine screws together. Very cool!

Both these sounds can be heard on Greenhouse's CD "I lie Awake". The song is "April Morning".

Cheers,
Michael

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Paul G.
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 10:27 PM

Well, the percussionist for my band is really quite inventive. My favorites are his making the sound of flames by crunching dried leaves inside and orange and red hankerchief for the song "Jacksonville Is Burning", and thumping on tin coffee cans for "All You Need (is a good cup of joe)". He also uses an assortment of kitchenware (pots,pans, and dish racks). He's really quite a strange fellow now that I think about it...

Paul

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 10:45 PM

There's a fellow who does the art show circuit who makes and sells what is essentially a "prepared hammer dulcimer". I'm sure he borrowed the idea from avant garde composer John Cage who "prepared" pianos by inserting bits of wood, metal etc. between the strings. He intertwines various metal objects such as washers, car keys, bolts etc. between the strings of the dulcimer. You can play the strings or you can tap on the metal objects themselves.

I remember one festival where he was set up just a few booths away from Jerry Read Smith, noted maker of real hammer dulcimers. Talk about going from the sublime to the ridiculous....

Bruce

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 11:28 PM

Nothing "odd" about them...but I like spoons.

Available anywhere food is served...and what folk-type gathering does not include spoons?

While most are drawn to metal ones.
I can endure the plastic ones.
But, for most queer old folky tunes
I prefer wooden spoons.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 11:34 PM

Given a lacking of spoons,
I just as soons
Prefer the crackin, knackin, clacking of bones, Ham bones, soup bones, chicken bones, good ol' buffalo bones.
Rhythem soft and rhythem deep,
In a pinch give me a sheep.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 11:38 PM

Given the spelling and context of your original posting...Staggering Eagle....

Your bladder was gladder than mine....when you began this thread... fine?

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Somewhere in the distant MC past...and the past of polite society....it was and embarassing discrace to be DRUNK in PUBLIC.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: harpgirl
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 11:45 PM

I like the bones and I'm gettin' a pretty good sound out of them since I have been paracticin'... gee, garg...you must have liked my poem about you. You've been talking in rhyme alot!!! hg

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: harpgirl
Date: 02 Dec 02 - 11:52 PM

you know...this one:

Subject: RE: BS: Love on the internet?
From: GUEST,Songmeister's secret admirer - PM
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 10:51 PM

                              Ode To a gargoyle

             The gargoyle guards my sullen heart
          I'm safe to dwell beneath his impish grin
         I watch the nighthawks dodge his winged alert
         Tannins bruise his lips and secrets stay within
      But lo' I hear the whippoorwill when he has banished care
         A trilling waterfall and laughter fill the air

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 03 Dec 02 - 12:24 AM

Glad you like a good solid bone - Harpy
Most women do.

Thanks for the poem...its nice to know we are not alone.
The verse's not perverse, and yet, its tone alone,
Says, Sale will Sail in a full winded gale.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: InOBU
Date: 03 Dec 02 - 10:59 AM

Hi Garg... I have an old set of horse bones, I found as part of a whole horse, or his whole skeliton, on a beach in Kerry... nicely dried and a tad green from the sea... lovely look lovely sound... As to odd percussion instruments, Gene Shepard used to play his head with small hammers, I think he called it the Cuffinspeal, cheers Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,JohnB
Date: 03 Dec 02 - 12:30 PM

When I do Blacksmith demonstrations at folk concerts, I always end up hitting Red Hot Metal on the Anvil in time with the music. Even get a round of applause now and again for a particularly interesting syncopation.
The other strange percussion thing I have at home is a bean pod. Not sure where it originates from, it's about 2 1/2 inches wide by 14 inches long and has the dried seeds inside, which are loose and rattle.
JohnB

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,Claymore
Date: 03 Dec 02 - 12:35 PM

John, In West Virginia those seed pods are called "Noisy Children" and come from a form of the Locust tree.

Subject: RE: BS: Odd percussion indtruments
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 04 Dec 02 - 12:14 AM

We certainly march to the beat of a different (if not distant) drummer around here.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 04 Dec 02 - 02:53 AM

Richard H - the instrument you describe is known in German folk musik as Teufelsgeige = Devil's violin.

The oddest percussion instruments I played are in our local Volunteer Fire Department. I told my fellow firefighters that our fire house is full of music, and proved it by banging tow bars with a hatchet, coupling keys with the metal tipper of my triangle, and empty fire extinguishers with keys. We formed a rhythm group and banged happily away, sometimes shouting "cha-cha-cha".
At this occasion I added a big "whoof" blowing a B-nozzle with an euphonium mouthpiece (this is no percussion instrument, but it fitted very well).

Wilfried

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: GUEST,Rex on the work 'puter
Date: 05 Dec 02 - 12:04 PM

There's a friend of mine that has, yep, the jawbone of an ass. Like in the old minstrel shows. He has a piece of hardwood and runs it across the teeth. Sort of a rattle. It tends to scare folks in the audience. A percussion instrument I sometimes play to music is perhaps more like concussion. Artillery.

Rex

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 10:52 AM

In Lortzing's opera Zar und Zimmermann (Czar and carpenter) there is a wonderful clog dance. Here the clogs are simulated by a woodblock.
Instead of that I used to clap two clogs over my head which made a good impression upon (or to, or on? Choose the right prep.) the audience.
The best however is the story how I bought them on the market. I choose the size fitting my wife's beautiful feet, and then I tested every pair for the sound. The saleswoman was flabbergasted. She had experienced a lot in her long life, she told me, but never before a customer choosing her clogs for their sound.

Wilfried

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: PageOfCups
Date: 09 Dec 02 - 03:43 PM

I've got something I picked up at an art fair in Phoenix (antibiotics haven't helped ;-) ), and for the life of me I don't know what it's made of. It's a bunch of what look like itty bitty cow hoofs on a decorative cord. It makes a nice rattle-y sound. I like it. But I'd like to know what the heck I'm playing when I play it. Help?

PoC

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 07:05 PM

The Till Family Rock Band

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Suegorgeous
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 08:13 PM

Went to see Rachel Unthank and the Winterset in Bristol this week. Becky plays percussion with her high heels on one track (Felton Lonnin, also on latest album).

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Leadfingers
Date: 09 Jun 08 - 08:41 PM

Jack - That looks more 'Melody' than straight percussion .

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Leadfingers
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 07:46 AM

Incidentally , reading back through , I see someone plays 'Head' with small hammers ! An old mate of mine , Steve Darrington , when he was playing keyboards and silly buggers in a band called Brewers Droop used to put an SM58 in his mouth and rap on his skull with his knuckles - by opening and closing his mouth he got a surpringly wide variety of sounds !!

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Grab
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 09:30 AM

LF, did he get it out again?! I can't help thinking of those stories about people who put a pool ball in their mouth for a bet and then find out about the phenomenon that your mouth will briefly open that wide but won't do it twice in a row, so they have to go to casualty and have someone take a crowbar to their jaw... :-)

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Leadfingers
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 10:42 AM

The Mic was on a stand , and not really INSIDE Steve's mouth ,but close enough to 'Pick Up' the varying sounds from Steves Skull ,
amplified by his open mouth !

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: GUEST,Trev
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 12:58 PM

I've seen two beer bottles used like a bodhran and tipper, also as bones. There's an interesting sound as they vibrate/rub together.

Also seen Gypsies using a wooden box/tea chest for a drum, sitting on it and drumming the cormers with hands.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: reggie miles
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 03:01 PM

Perhaps not so very odd in the traditional sense but an image of what I most often use can be found at the following link. my 1929 Maytag Custom Special Dixie Delta Deluxe Eldorado Rhythm Board.

I've been threatening to debut my urinal bongo set but I'm not sure the general public is quite ready for that yet.