The glass marimba is a type of

idiophone An idiophone is any musical instrument that creates sound primarily by the vibration of the instrument itself, without the use of air flow (as with aerophones), strings (chordophones), membranes (membranophones) or electricity ( electroph ...

also known as a vitrephone or

crystallophone A crystallophone is a musical instrument that produces sound from glass. One of the best known crystallophones is the glass harmonica, a set of rotating glass bowls which produce eerie, clear tones when rubbed with a wet finger. Musical glas ...

Marimba The marimba () is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars that are struck by mallets. Below each bar is a resonator pipe that amplifies particular harmonics of its sound. Compared to the xylophone, the timbre ...

translates to "a

xylophone The xylophone (; ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars struck by mallets. Like the glockenspiel (which uses metal bars), the xylophone essentially consists of a set of tuned wooden keys arranged in ...

-like instrument" from an African language, probably

Bantu Bantu may refer to: *Bantu languages, constitute the largest sub-branch of the Niger–Congo languages *Bantu peoples, over 400 peoples of Africa speaking a Bantu language * Bantu knots, a type of African hairstyle *Black Association for National ...

. The

glass Glass is a non-crystalline, often transparent, amorphous solid that has widespread practical, technological, and decorative use in, for example, window panes, tableware, and optics. Glass is most often formed by rapid cooling ( quenching ...

keys are made of either hard glass (

plate glass Plate glass, flat glass or sheet glass is a type of glass, initially produced in plane form, commonly used for windows, glass doors, transparent walls, and windscreens. For modern architectural and automotive applications, the flat glass is ...

) or soft glass ( stained glass). The keys are resonated with either a single open top box or individual

resonators A resonator is a device or system that exhibits resonance or resonant behavior. That is, it naturally oscillates with greater amplitude at some frequencies, called resonant frequencies, than at other frequencies. The oscillations in a resonator ...

for each key.

Mallets A mallet is a tool used for imparting force on another object, often made of rubber or sometimes wood, that is smaller than a maul or beetle, and usually has a relatively large head. The term is descriptive of the overall size and propor ...

used to play the marimba can be constructed using a compressed silicone ball (

bouncy ball A bouncy ball or rubber ball is a spherical toy ball, usually fairly small, made of elastic material which allows it to bounce against hard surfaces. When thrown against a hard surface, bouncy balls retain their momentum and much of their kinet ...

) attached to one end of a wooden or synthetic dowel. These mallets bring out the purest sound from glass marimba. Other types of mallets are used for different effects. The

tuning system In music, there are two common meanings for tuning: * Tuning practice, the act of tuning an instrument or voice. * Tuning systems, the various systems of pitches used to tune an instrument, and their theoretical bases. Tuning practice Tun ...

of a glass marimba can be whatever is desired. Glass marimbas are utilised by the

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

ian

percussion ensemble A percussion ensemble is a musical ensemble consisting of only percussion instruments. Although the term can be used to describe any such group, it commonly refers to groups of classically trained percussionists performing primarily classical m ...

, Uakti.

Construction

Glass marimba can be constructed in a variety of ways. How one resonates the keys governs the construction method and design. Resonation can be accomplished using a single resonator which all the keys resonate into, such as an open top box, or individual

for each key which can be a tube, box, or sphere. Single box resonators can be constructed from

wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin ...

, or

metal A metal (from Greek μέταλλον ''métallon'', "mine, quarry, metal") is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electricity and heat relatively well. Metals are typicall ...

among a variety of materials. Individual resonators can be made from

gourds Gourds include the fruits of some flowering plant species in the family Cucurbitaceae, particularly ''Cucurbita'' and '' Lagenaria''. The term refers to a number of species and subspecies, many with hard shells, and some without. One of the earl ...

, wood,

bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of evergreen perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family. The origin of the word "bamboo" is uncertain, ...

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

, glass, pvc, or metal, to name a few. The keys also govern the design of the marimba due to the fact that the keys are supported at points called nodes and these dictate the shape of the marimba due to the graduated lengths of the keys and how one supports them. Also, the width of the keys, which can be graduated, determines the overall length. Keys can be made from

or stained glass. With stained glass, two pieces must be fused together in a

kiln A kiln is a thermally insulated chamber, a type of oven, that produces temperatures sufficient to complete some process, such as hardening, drying, or chemical changes. Kilns have been used for millennia to turn objects made from clay int ...

to obtain the necessary thickness of 1/4" for the most common glass marimba tunings, though thinner and thicker keys can be used for low and high tunings. Tuning is accomplished most commonly by removing glass from the end of the key which causes the note to go up. Removing glass from the bottom of the key will cause the note to go down but is only feasible if one is using opaque glass for the keys. The keys are best supported on a pad of open cell

foam Foams are materials formed by trapping pockets of gas in a liquid or solid. A bath sponge and the head on a glass of beer are examples of foams. In most foams, the volume of gas is large, with thin films of liquid or solid separating the ...

mounted to a thin piece of wood and encased in cloth. The keys are attached with double sided clear tape. Silicone glue is also used. An alternate method of attachment is to use posts between each key on one side and a single post going through a hole in the key on the other side.

References

Crystallophones Stick percussion idiophones Pitched percussion instruments {{Mallet-stub