Hand percussion is a

percussion instrument A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

that is held in the hand. They can be made from wood, metal or plastic, bottles stops and are usually shaken, scraped, or tapped with fingers or a stick. It includes all instruments that are not

drum The drum is a member of the percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system, it is a membranophone. Drums consist of at least one membrane, called a drumhead or drum skin, that is stretched over a she ...

s or pitched percussion instruments such as the

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 ...

or the

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 ...

Shakers

shaker (percussion) The word shaker describes various percussive musical instruments used for creating rhythm in music. They are called shakers because the method of creating the sound involves shaking them – moving them back and forth in the air rather than strik ...

is any instrument that makes a noise when shaken. Historically they were naturally occurring items such as seed pods. A

caxixi A caxixi () is a percussion instrument consisting of a closed basket with a flat bottom filled with seeds or other small particles. The round bottom is traditionally cut from a dried gourd. The caxixi is an indirectly struck idiophone. Like the ...

is a basketwork shaker with a gourd base.

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 earli ...

are used all over the world and covered with a net with shells or seeds to create an instrument such as the

shekere The shekere (from Yoruba Ṣẹ̀kẹ̀rẹ̀) is a West African percussion instrument consisting of a dried gourd with beads or cowries woven into a net covering the gourd. The Shekere originated in a tribe in Nigeria called the Yoruba. The in ...

. Modern shakers are often cylinders made from metal wood or plastic containing small hard items such as seeds, stones, or plastic - an example is the

Egg Shaker An egg shaker or ganzá is a hand percussion instrument, in the idiophone category, that makes a noise when shaken. Functionally it is similar to a maraca. Typically the outer casing or container is ovoidal or egg-shaped. It is partially full ...

.There is another category of shaken instrument using jingles, little discs of metal which tap together when shaken.

Tambourines The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called " zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though ...

fall into this category.

Scrapers

This can be a wood, metal or plastic instrument which has ridges on its body. Often known as Guiro, rhythms are created by running a thin stick up and down the ridges at different speeds. Gourds or bamboo have traditionally been used as they have a resonant hollow body and can easily be cut with ridges. A common type from Asia is a carved wooden

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely Carnivore, carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order (biology), order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-f ...

which has ridges cut on its back and its mouth and belly hollowed out.

Cowbells

Cowbells originate from the bells tied around the necks of livestock. They are any type of hand held bell tapped with fingers, wood or metal. They occur all over the world and are used extensively in

Latin Percussion {{for, the company, Latin Percussion Latin percussion is a family of percussion, membranophone, lamellophone and idiophone instruments used in Latin music. Instruments Afro-Cuban and Puerto Rican styles Folkloric and Santeria * Trap drums * Abakua ...

music and often found as part of a standard rock drum kit. The name

cowbell A cowbell (or cow bell) is a bell worn around the neck of free-roaming livestock so herders can keep track of an animal via the sound of the bell when the animal is grazing out of view in hilly landscapes or vast plains. Although they are t ...

usually refers to a single bell. The

Agogô An agogô ( Yoruba: ''agogo'', meaning bell) is a single or a multiple bell now used throughout the world but with origins in traditional Yoruba and Edo music and also in the samba '' baterias'' (percussion ensembles). The agogô may be the old ...

bell usually refers to a double or triple bell.

Triangles

The

triangle A triangle is a polygon with three Edge (geometry), edges and three Vertex (geometry), vertices. It is one of the basic shapes in geometry. A triangle with vertices ''A'', ''B'', and ''C'' is denoted \triangle ABC. In Euclidean geometry, an ...

is a piece of steel bent in the shape of a triangle tapped with another piece of steel. It is suspended on one hand which can be open and closed to alter the sound. Very commonly used in South American Music to give a persistent high pitched pulse.

Sticks

Tapping two sticks together is the simplest form of hand percussion, and has developed a place in traditional music all over the world.

Indigenous Australians Indigenous Australians or Australian First Nations are people with familial heritage from, and membership in, the ethnic groups that lived in Australia before British colonisation. They consist of two distinct groups: the Aboriginal peoples ...

use ''

clapping sticks Clapsticks, also spelt clap sticks and also known as bilma, bimli, clappers, musicstick or just stick, are a traditional Australian Aboriginal instrument. They serve to maintain rhythm in voice chants, often as part of an Aboriginal ceremony ...

'' alongside the didgeridoo, and

claves Claves (; ) are a percussion instrument consisting of a pair of short, wooden sticks about 20–25 centimeters (8–10 inches) long and about 2.5 centimeters (1 inch) in diameter. Although traditionally made of wood (typically rosewood, ebony o ...

are an integral part of South American Music.

Small drums

There is a variety of small hand held drums such as

tamborim A ''tamborim'' ( or ) is a small, round Brazilian frame drum of Portuguese and African origin. The frame is 6" in width and may be made of metal, plastic, or wood. The head is typically made of nylon and is normally very tightly tuned in orde ...

which fall into the Hand Percussion category.

Listening

References

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