November 30, 2006
Native American Flutes and the Pentatonic Kalimba

More about the pentatonic kalimba/pentatonic scale.

The kalimba and the Native American Fluet (NAF) are kindred spirits. They are both ancient instruments with an evolving tradition of music in today's world. They are both relatively simple, and you can play them both without a formal education in music. Yet, they are both able to play very deeply personaly and expressive music which seems to transcend their simplicity and their ancient origins. Or perhaps they are able to do what they do because of their simplicity and their ancient origins.

The Hugh Tracey Pentatonic Kalimba comes tuned to G major, but my Pentatonic Book gives equal time to the G major and G minor pentatonic scales.

Native American Flutes come in all lengths and all keys, as well as different modes, but for some reason the most common key for the NAF is F# minor pentatonic (i.e., "mode 1" to people "in the know"). Here's an idea: when you get your Pentatonic Kalimba, retune it from G major pentatonic to G minor pentatonic, use the second half of the book (minor pentatonic) to learn how to play, and when you are good at the kalimba, retune it down to F# minor pentatonic (which is accomplished by pulling each tine out a bit longer, shifting each flat by half a step) so it is more friendly to the most common key of the NAF.