| WindA wind instrument, or areophone given its technical term, is a musical instrument which contains some form of resonator (usually a tube), in which a column of air is set into vibration by the player. In most wind instruments, the air is blown into the instrument at or near one end of the tube and exits at the other end. The place where the air is blown in is called the mouthpiece, and the pitch or key or the instrument is determined by the length of the tube. Woodwind instruments fall in to two categories - brass and wood. Some examples of wind instruments include the: didgeridoo, flute, alphorn, conch shell, natural horn, shofar, tuba, Tibetan trumpet. Although the length of the instrument denotes the pitch, different notes can be easily attained, for example: - With a flute you can change the effective length of the tube by covering or opening holes along the flute with your fingers,
- With a saxaphone you can change the length of the vibrating air column by operating valves and or pistons which route the air through additional tubing, thereby increasing the overall tube length, and lowering the fundamental pitch,
- With a slide didgeridoo or vietnamese lotus flute, you can change the length of the vibrating air column by lengthening and/or shortening the instrument via a sliding mechanism.
Many people find the easiest and perhaps the most enchanting flute to play is the Native American flute. The Native American flute is of the fipple family of flute and does not require the player to produce the sound with the shape of the mouth like when playing the western silver flute, or the Andean pan-pipes. The fipple on a Native American flute is usually a carved totem, like a wolf, bear or eagle, which sits atop the flute towards the mouthpiece end.
Another bonus for the budding musician is that the Native American Indian flute is in the easy-to-play five note pentatonic scale. Although you'll notice that the Native American flute has six fingering holes, when playing the pentatonic minor scale, the third hole from the mouthpiece is always covered. |
