Making a kalimba (thumb piano)

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Making a kalimba (thumb piano)

A kalimba is an instrument that you play with your thumbs.

It is also called a THUMB piano.

Requirements

Wood board
Sandpaper
4 metal hairpins
Decoration materials
Pliers
Hammer
Tacker (special stapler)
An adult who can help with stapling

How to make the kalimba

Use a piece of sandpaper to smooth the edges and corners of your wooden board.
Use markers, stickers, stars, or paper to decorate your board.
Carefully bend 4 hairpins open with a pair of pliers and hammer them straight.
Place the strings next to each other on one side of your board. Keep some space between the strings.
See the example on the website. Fasten them with a staple.
You can change the sound of your string by adding another staple a bit lower. It’s fun if every string has a different sound, of course.
Bend the strings slightly upwards at the end of the last staple.
Test your kalimba! Does it sound the way you want?
Hammer the staples extra tight.
Have fun making music!

Sanza, kalimba, likembe, or mbira: these are all African names for the thumb piano. The instrument is widely used in Central Africa and belongs to the category of lamellophones.

A lamellophone is a plucked instrument that often consists of a wooden board and a sound box with attached metal, wooden, or bamboo lamellas (tines). The lamellas have unequal lengths and therefore produce different pitches. They are plucked by the player's thumbs, causing them to vibrate and produce sound. This is how the instrument got the name thumb piano.