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Mark Holdaway

What People Are Saying About Kalimba Magic

“I love Mark’s Kalimba Magic’s kalimbas. I own one so far (Hokema Kalimba Sansula Deluxe) and I’m eyeing more to come. I am fascinated by this instrument ever since my teen years spent in DR Congo and Burundi, Africa. My brother and I had a couple of them made by local artisans. Today it means SO MUCH to have someone such as Mark caring for kalimbas and helping them find new owners! This instrument will bring true peace and inspiration to your day. Just one strike and I can step deep within myself, connect with the world around, in a very special way. Mark’s kalimbas are spread with love. He

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Mark Holdaway

New eBook: 52 Exercises and Songs for the Hugh Tracey HotShot-11 Kalimba

This is the original 52 Exercises & Songs collection for the Hugh Tracey HotShot-11 (aka “Hugh Tracey Celeste Diatonic Jr.”)… but formatted and done up as a very nice eBook that leads you through playing the HotShot-11 in all of its glory. Get the HotShot-11 Download Today! Most kalimbas start on “Do” (as in “Doe, a Deer”)… the key note of the kalimba. The HotShot-11 is rooted in G… but the low note is D, the 5th, or “So” (as in “Do Re Mi Fa So”). This will slow you down a great deal if you don’t understand it… but if you do understand it, the low 5 in the

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Mark Holdaway

How do you like the “365 Days to Kalimba Mastery” for 17/C Kalimba?

Download your “365 Days to Kalimba Mastery, Volume I” Today! The “365 Days to Kalimba Mastery” is formatted to display tablature for about four measures of looped music on your phone. With these bite-sized lessons, you don’t get lost on a big page full of tablature. You can focus in on learning a small bit of music that you can hold in your memory. The PDF eBook includes live links to the sound files, so you can hear how it is supposed to go and play along. The lessons build on each other, to help get you to play some amazing kalimba music! Hear what customers are saying about this

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Blog
Mark Holdaway

Really Nice Tuning Hammers, from Magadi of Course!

The Magadi tuning hammer has a nice wooden handle that fits perfectly in your hand, and is also perfectly balanced. For a superior kalimba tuning experience. Get your Magadi Balanced Tuning Hammer. Here are some relevant details: we have two types of kalimba tuning hammers, these Magadi hammers with the wood handle, and the generic hammers with just the narrow metal handles. If you add a tuning hammer to your kalimba order, it will be the generic hammer. To get the Magadi tuning hammer, you need to order the product “Magadi Tuning Hammer”. Actually, the Magadi kalimbas do not automatically come with any tuning hammer. The Bamboo 17 and the

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Mark Holdaway

US Supreme Court Dooms the World to Excessive Climate Change – Please Act Now

  I will spare you my general opinions of the US Supreme court, and the details of how we got to this place. I recognize the right of all people to hold their own beliefs, and I trust that the world is a better place when we are able to hear and understand each other. But the US Supreme Court, in denying that the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is not legally permitted to regulate green house gases is essentially dooming the entire world to a more-or-less unlivable future. This could doom approximately half of all species of living things on earth over the next few centuries as habitat becomes

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Mark Holdaway

It is here! “365 Days to Kalimba Mastery” for 17/C Kalimba

Download your “365 Days to Kalimba Mastery, Volume I” Today! Why You Need This Book This book serves you bite sized bits of kalimba wisdom and beauty, that fit on your phone screen, to help you play kalimba like I do. Each lesson has one screenful of tablature (typically 4 measures), a sound recording, and my explanatory words. Many lessons also have staff notation. The kalimba is a totally amazing instrument, capable of much magic and much music. But almost all of the instructional material available for the kalimba focuses only on the melody. The true brilliance of the kalimba derives from the combination of melody, harmony and rhythm working

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Mark Holdaway

The Hugh Tracey Kalimbas – Are They Worth It?

My very first kalimba was a Hugh Tracey Kalimba, back in 1986. I love the Hugh Tracey kalimbas, especially my older ones. (I do have readers who chime in and remind me they have been playing since the 70s, or even earlier, and they too love their Hugh Tracey Kalimbas.) Customer Reviews Here are some of the things that my recent customers say about the Hugh Tracey Kalimbas: Taylor Loves the Alto Chromatic Kalimba I’ve purchased four Hugh Tracey kalimbas from you and they are hands down the best kalimbas I’ve ever played. One of them, The Hugh Tracey Chromatic Alto, is my favorite kalimba I own. This kalimba made

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Mark Holdaway

Nadi Qamar and his “Mama-Likembi” Kalimba from the 1970s

Ready to Have Your Kalimba Mind Blown? Nadi Qamar was an African American who pioneered the use of neo-traditional Kalimba in the 1960s and 1970s. A jazz pianist by training, Nadi made a fantastic album of kalimba music on an instrument of his own design, the “Mama Likembi,” in his own tuning. Listen to it through the YouTube embed above. The tuning is a Middle-Eastern sort of tuning. Sometimes he plays it more like a pentatonic kalimba. Since his instrument was an amalgam of several different kalimbas, they may have had different tunings? Neo-Traditional Kalimba? By neo-traditional, I mean that even though the instrument was not a traditional kalimba in

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Blog
Mark Holdaway

Feel the Music Vibrations in Your Body

  These two kalimba models have massive wood bodies. The massive bodies mean they will not be as loud, but the vibration of each note will last longer. I have customers who absolutely love these massive kalimbas because they facilitate really feeling the vibrations. That could be feeling the vibrations in your hands… or a friend, partner, or client feeling the vibrations in their body as you lay the instrument on their back or chest and play for them. The Magadi M17 is the economy model – lets say, roughly 75% as good as the B17, but about 30% the cost… a great value! The Hokeme B17 is a great

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