How to choose a suitable Steel Tongue drum？
I don’t know how to play the guitar or the piano. I just want to learn a simple musical instrument. One is to allow myself to try new things, and the other is to relieve my work and life by playing the instrument by myself.
I searched a lot of learning materials about musical instruments on the Internet, and finally found an unpopular instrument, the Steel Tongue drum. A percussion instrument that is very easy to learn, you can learn in a few hours. And the sound is very melodious, heavy and ethereal, suitable for meditation and meditation. I entered the pit of ethereal drums.
I use my more than two years of learning experience and the knowledge of Steel tongue drums to introduce the ethereal drums from the shallower to the deeper. I hope that as a experienced guy, I can help beginners spend less money and buy a suitable Steel Tongue Drums.
What is Steel Tongue Drums?
The Steel Tongue drum is also called the color hollow drum, the worry-free drum, the Wangyou drum or Ethereal drum. It is a new type of percussion instrument that makes a sound when the disc-shaped steel tongue vibrates. It is one of the national instruments of china .
We can often hear the sound of ethereal drums in meditation houses, tea houses, piano houses, yoga meditation, prenatal and early education, music therapy and other places.
Steel Tongue drum learning is simple and friendly to novices. It is very suitable for musical instrument lovers who do not have a foundation in music theory as an introductory instrument to learn.
The sound of the empty drum is driven by the vibration of the tongue to resonate the entire cavity, so as long as the tongue can vibrate effectively, it can produce a melodious and pure drum sound.
There are two ways to make the Steel Tongue Drum sound, one is to use drumsticks, and the other is to use your hands to beat the Ethereal Drum to make it sound.
1. Play with drumsticks
The usual way of playing is to beat the Steel Tongue Drum with rubber drumsticks. Hold the two sticks two-thirds away from the head of the drum with both hands, and gently tap on the position of the phonetic symbols and notes accurately on the drum.
2. Playing with bare hands
Of course you can also play with your bare hands, beat, slap, or use your fingers to play the drum. Bare-handed performance is more standard, and you can’t pronounce it with force, but it looks more handsome when you play with your own hands. It is recommended that novices learn to play with drumsticks first. After the number, they can use their bare hands to attract young ladies in public performances.
Three factors affecting the sound quality and price of ethereal drums
1. Material
Class A, copper material, the most expensive, and more tongues that can carry.
Class B, made of carbon steel, second in price, usually 11-13 tongues.
Class C.steel-titanium alloy, the lowest price, the tongue range is 8-13 tongues
2.Number of Tongue
The Steel Tongue drum is divided into 8 tones and 13 tones. The eight-tone ethereal drum is composed of five tones of Gong, Shang, Jiao, Zheng, and Yu. Mixed mode composition.
With the development of Steel tongue drums, in addition to 8-tone and 13-tone, 11-tone, 14-tone and 15-tone ethereal drums have been developed. Therefore, the common ethereal drums on the market are 8-tone, 11-tone, and 13-tone. 14 tones, 15 tones are the ethereal drums of 5 tones,
A tongue represents a tone, and the more tongues, the more tones the steel tongue drum can play. Of course, the more tongues, the larger the size of the ethereal drum and the higher the price
3.Size of Drum
The common sizes of Steel Tongue Drums for adults are 8 inches, 10 inches, 12 inches, 13 inches, and 14 inches. The larger the size, the more tones that can be carried and the more songs that can be played.
There are also 6-inch ethereal drums on the market that are specially designed for children to learn and use, with only 8 notes, which are used as children’s enlightenment instruments. The 8-tone is far from satisfying for the adult’s performance, the lowest is the 13-tone.
Steel Tongue drums below 10 inches have a narrow cavity and a sharper tone. More than 10 inches ethereal drum cavity is wide, melodious tone
As an entry-level Steel Tongue drums, I recommend buying a 12-inch Steel Tongue drums. The 12-inch ethereal drum cavity is large enough to produce a more melodious and thick sound, with a large cavity and a large drum head. The area of each tongue corresponds to the area. It’s also relatively large, and it’s more friendly for beginners, and it won’t be mixed
