Odd percussion instruments

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 03:16 PM

An axe and a wrench.
I would hit the axe with the wrench to simulate a stardrill to back up a friend singing Sixteen Tons.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Dead Horse
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 03:37 PM

I use one of these
but not the plastic version, rather a home made wooden article done up to look like piano keys.
Its a simple way to create that Zydeco rub-board sound without having a corrugated iron vest round ya neck :-)
Lark in the Morning have a huge selection of weird and wunnerful instruments.
I also carry around a cajun triangle, two coconut halves, a shaky corn-cob, a wee tambourine, a shaky banana and some plastic knuckle dusters with bells on.
A true artist, thats wot I is, mate.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Jack Campin
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 06:18 PM

There is a group from somewhere on the eastern US seaboard who do tracklaying work songs. These are accompanied by the sound of hammers bashing rails into place. They toured the UK last year, bringing a set of sledgehammers and yards of steel rail with them. (I missed hearing them).

The most industrial thing I've ever heard was a performance by the Glasgow experimental-arts group Test Department in the early 90s. It was held in an abandoned locomotive factory that still had much of the original equipment in place. At one point there was a group of about a dozen people doing Stalinist-style callisthenics on a moving locomotive transporter (just visible through the smoke and flares) with a percussion ensemble of assorted metallophones, with the equivalent of the large gong in a gamelan ensemble being a suspended mixer bucket from a full-size premixed-concrete truck, whacked with six feet of railway line suspended from a chain. There was so much going on you could hardly hear it. There were several megalomanic shows like that in Glasgow around that time, I miss that stuff.

Nobody's mentioned the lagerphone yet.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 06:58 PM

I've been thinking about converting my two spun steel SCA helmet blanks into a bongo set...

Jack, we Aussies have drunk the lager phone under the table... it's easy to play, but a bugger to get the parts... :-)

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: azfiddle
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 10:16 PM

How about a slinky? The plastic ones don't work- you have to use the metal ones, but they come in several sizes which give somewhat different tonal qualities....


My bandmate introduced these at the Walnut Valley Festival in Kansas (Winfield) - sound sample on the "Contra dance set" on the myspace page or web page for Round the House.

Sharon

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Rowan
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 11:44 PM

Jack, we Aussies have drunk the lager phone under the table... it's easy to play, but a bugger to get the parts... :-)

Plastic seals are trickier to remove than the old cork seals and any platic left in the crown will deaden the tone. But if you collect the steel thingies that stop the wires on champagne corks from cutting through the cork, you can make a champerphone.

Linsey Pollak does a fine line in unusual instruments, some of which are percussion. Satay sticks tuned by varying their length while tapped might not be everyone's idea of "percussion" and the sound of gaffer tape coming off the roll (used in Kev the roadie) even less so but his most recent use of a bicycle (spokes, tyres, pump, saddle stem and chain) is seriously percussive.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: katlaughing
Date: 10 Jun 08 - 11:54 PM

Anyone mention push brooms? There's a wonderful stomp video on youtube with metal garbage cans and lid, plus push brooms used for percussion along with the dancers' shoes, hands, bodies, etc.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Rowan
Date: 11 Jun 08 - 01:37 AM

In the mid 70s there was a melodeon player in East Gippsland whose false teeth were not quite a perfect fit. The local ladies would queue to have him as a partner at the Saturday night dances because, while he danced, he'd keep them in his mouth but click away on them to the rhythm of the music; in their ear, while dancing!

Better than castanets.

And he'd do it occasionally while playing dance tunes, as well.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Jack Campin
Date: 11 Jun 08 - 04:49 AM

One of the Goon Shows had a plotline about a Spanish dancer who needed a large collection of false teeth to use as castanets, so she ambushed people to steal them.

The BBC came up with the most inspired sound effect I'ev ever heard - somebody being whacked on the back of the head with a mallet, followed by the clang of their false teeth falling into a bucket.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 11 Jun 08 - 09:38 AM

A bunch of Aussie steel workers achieved international fame as "The Tap Dogs" - percussive tap dancing.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: trevek
Date: 12 Jun 08 - 07:49 AM

A singer in Poland once told me of meeting an Estonian blacksmith who played 'tunes' by banging his anvil with his hammer.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: GUEST,JB
Date: 12 Jun 08 - 11:10 AM

On the Bristol Beeb Points West programme last night they had an Arab playing trad instruments plus a WW2 jerrycan, which in fact sounded pretty good.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 12 Jun 08 - 08:48 PM

Black bin-liner - about five minutes into this from Newfoundlanders Buddy Wasisname and the Other Fellers on YouTube.

Ross

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: GUEST,erinmaidin
Date: 13 Jun 08 - 05:49 AM

Saw a duo in Indiana about 25 years ago (yes...I'm THAT old!). Two fellas, one on guitar and the other on various and sundry instruments of persecution....er...percussion. Anyway, the fella had a large square of old kitchen linoleum...about 18inch square...that he held on either side and "waffled" on....called it..actually...a "waffle board". Made a great "woompa woompa" sound and was particularly effective on that old gem "Tie Me Kangaroo Down Sport".

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 13 Jun 08 - 08:37 PM

That's a "wobble" board, introduced to UK audiences in the sixties asnd seventies (along with the Stylophone and didgeridoo) by Australian artist/entertainer/singer/songwriter Rolf Harris. "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport" was one of numerous songs from his pen. He's still around, appeared at the Sidmouth Folk Festival some years back, and was more recently honoured? by being permitted to paint a portrait of HM the Queen.

I don't think linoleum would work - at least, not the stuff we used to get over here - too stiff and "dead". The sheet material used by Rolf Harris is known as hardboard, reconstituted wood fibre, smooth one side and textured the other. I think wobble-boards were even sold in music shops for a while.

Damn! Wikipedia says all that and more - should have looked first.

Ross

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Dead Horse
Date: 14 Jun 08 - 04:17 AM

I guess the ultimate in "Shaky Things" would be a Quality Street tin loaded with nuts n bolts or marbles.
You might even be welcomed into a song circle until ya started shakin it :-)

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: trevek
Date: 14 Jun 08 - 01:42 PM

Talking of digeridoos, a firned of mine used one as a persussion instrument of a different time.

He got into a fight with someone at a party. The person pulled a knife, whereupon Rab grabbed the nearest thing... a didge... and percussed the knifeman's head with it... In Rab's words, "I didgeri-done him".

Mentioning trays, Spider Stacey of the Pogues used to batter his head with a beer tray.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Kaleea
Date: 14 Jun 08 - 06:29 PM

Years ago when I was teaching Music, I had some special ed students who had limited use of their limbs, & required very lightweight & easy to hold & play items which could be shaken, tapped, etc. I also used some long seed pods as shakers, which I picked right up off the ground in front of a school building in addition to various sticks, which have long been some of my favorite percussion instruments.
I like to use an oriental fan--not the type which unfolds, but one which might be shaped as an oval (or whatever) in which silk is stretched over a wire frame & is held by a handle. This is terrific for kids to tap gently & they sound quietly drumlike, each having a different pitch.
I suspended from a string a very long bolt (@ 11") used in making jet planes, then held it for the child to tap with any metal implement (spoon, triangle beater, etc., or if nothing else, a stick). This makes a wonderful long ringing tone! If you wiggle it as it rings it creates a vibratolike tone. I once rang it & held it near the ear of one child from behind & found out that he was not deaf as his parents & Dr.'s had believed! I showed the aircraft bolts (& other stuff) to the the head of percussion at my alma mater, & he was intringued. Since the aircraft industry was the main industry in that small city, he wrote a musical work for orchestra & suspended aircraft bolts of various lengths.
I also have fun playing percussively on my little Celtic Harp. There are a great many sounds you can coax out of a Harp, & other instruments for that matter, & you don't need to be Tommy Emmanuel to do it. The famous 20th century composer John Cage wrote & performed piano works playing the insides of a grand piano.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 Jun 08 - 06:57 PM

I have a Tibetan ringing bowl beside this computer. I haven't figured out a performance use for it but I like to bong it every so often, it makes the same sort of long ringing tone leeneia described.

An even more private percussion instrument is the lid of a large wok. Balance it on your head and hit the rim. You get an amazing stereophonic gong sound.

Laurence Picken's book on Turkish folk instruments tries to apply the Sachs-Hornbostel classification to this sort of thing - most of the taxonomic space is taken up with children's toys. My favourite was popping a just-turned wet clay pot by smacking it flat with your hand.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: RangerSteve
Date: 15 Jun 08 - 08:40 AM

Don't know if this has been mentioned yet, but bottle caps, the kind that pop up when you first open the bottle - Snapple caps are the best, you put the cap over your mouth and push the middle in and out with your finger, moving your tongue back and forth to get different notes. Snapple ran a radio ad with a professional rock drummer playing one. It's a great way to annoy your co-workers.

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 05 Mar 10 - 02:05 PM

What about claves clah vays (what my kindergarten teacher called rhythm sticks)?

Thinking about getting a pair, because they would do well with some blues songs and even Poverty Knocks to replicate sound of loom.

Would they be considered too latin?

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: John P
Date: 05 Mar 10 - 06:30 PM

As someone who started driving my parents out of their minds at age 5 by drumming on everything in sight, I can confidently say that ANYTHING can be a percussion instrument.

legs
stomach
butt
cereal boxes
light bulbs (don't try this at home . . .)
water bottle
any type of pipe
telephone
adding machine
clothing
mattress
garden hose
kelp
any kind of food
paper
garden shears
spouse
cats and dogs
fish tank
bicycle (lots of different drums there)

My ex-wife actually has an album credit for playing "scrap lumber". The bodran was being too boomy, and the studio was undergoing a remodeling project.

John

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 05 Mar 10 - 07:25 PM

Just reminiscing last night as a friend was showing off his latest birthday present of a proper cajon "complete with pre-amp" to boot, that a few years ago guys were just sitting on cardboard boxes and slapping them with snare drum brushes!
And like John P, if you're caught napping without your bodhran, djembe, shaky eggs, triangle or full set of timpani, then anything goes!

Subject: RE: Odd percussion instruments
From: Howard Jones
Date: 06 Mar 10 - 02:29 PM

When the Electropathics recorded Martin Graebe's "Stonecracker John" we wanted some appropriate percussion. Our percussionist Pierce Butler had an impressive selection of bangy things, but nothing made the right sound. We ended up using metal extension tubes taken from the studio's vacuum cleaner, which we banged on the floor.

Sadly, the vacuum cleaner never made it to the live performances.