Xylophone essay

Xylophone. People play the xylophone by hitting the bars with a mallet (a kind of drum stick). Each piece of wood is a different length, so they play different notes when they are hit. The bars are arranged like the keys of a piano. Underneath the bars there are long tubes, called resonators, which make the sound last longer.

Xylophones have not played a major role in East Asian music, however. In contrast, many forms of xylophones are found in Africa. Many African xylophones show similarities to those of Southeast Asia in tuning and construction, but questions of the influences of trade and migration are controversial. The amadinda is made of logs.

Xylophone. The xylophone is first mentioned in Europe in 1511. Known as hölzernes Gelächter (“wooden percussion”) or Strohfiedel (“straw fiddle,” because the bars were supported on straw), it was long a Central European folk instrument, in which the bars extended away from the player instead of in a line across him.

Xylophone, from Greek xylon and phonē, “wood” and “sound”, percussion instrument consisting of a set of graduated, tuned wooden bars supported at nodal (nonvibrating) points and struck with sticks or padded mallets.