Newsgroups: bit.listserv.allmusic
Date:         Fri, 22 Jan 1993 11:14:40 PST
Comments:     Resent-From: "BREATHING THE FALL OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT
              IN....." <MASUDA@SJSUVM1>
Comments:     Originally-From: "Out,
              out - you'll not feel the fall-out..." <OLIVOTTO@ITNCISCA.BITNET>
Comments:     Warning -- original Sender: tag was ALLMUSIC@AUVM
From:         "BREATHING THE FALL OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN....."
              <MASUDA@SJSUVM1.BITNET>
Subject:      Sorry, can't resist...

(note for Leonard at end of this post)...

Marco says:

>        More seriously, Mike: the weird object made with spring coil you
>showed me in San Francisco was just great. What was the name? I'd like to
>build one for myself too...

Colloquially called a "thumb piano", but regionally known as a kalimba,
sansa, or mbira, depending on the where in Africa.  I call mine an
electric mbira.  The kalimba is the most common, because it is the simplest in
its make--it is usually composed of a dozen tines (spring wire flattened
by heating and hammering at one end) at different lengths that can be
adjusted for tuning by moving the tine up or back along the
seating.  The sansa is just another name for the kalimba.  Now both
the kalimba and and the sansa can be as simple as affixing the tines
onto a piece of wood (actually some tines are made from wood also), but
often the wood body is modified to fit onto half a gourd (glued on).
The gourd acts as a resonating chamber.  The mbira is a slightly different
instrument--the body is placed in the center of a large bowl-shaped gourd
so that the sound is resonating, but is focused back onto the player.
Often, there would be bottlecaps fixed onto the body or bits of metal
wrapped around the individual tines, to provide a buzzy sound (it may not
be pleasant to our ears, but to an African mbira player, it sounds
"louder" and more present.  I have a similar feature on mine, where I
placed paper clips onto some of the tines.  The mbira tines are placed in
a different fashion to that of the kalimba and sansa--the kalimba and
sansa have a near symmetrical tine configuration, and is played with
thumbs primarily.  The mbira has three sets of tines.  On the left there
are two rowsof tines--a short row along the top (bent up more to make it
stand out among the long tines) and a long row along the bottom.
On the right, there are several small tines.  It's been a while for me
to remember the significance of the placement of the tines, but gen. the
tines are tuned to the ears of the individual to however he/she sees fit,
and the tines are played using thumb and first finger, for more
inricate patterns and polyrhythms.  I call mine an electric mbira,
because the tines are arranged in this unique fashion.  I affixed
the body to a wooden box, and glued a piezoelectric pickup onto the
body inside the box.  So now I can plug the thing into a digital delay, or
a distortion box and have a jolly good time playing electric mbira.
Marco saw and heard it, and I gave him a recording of "Electric
Mbira Composition #1 (excerpt)" just as a teaser.  I eventually would like
to make a bigger one with more tines, but this suffices for now.
For a good recording of kalimba, check out Geoffrey Oryema _Exile_
(Real World).

>P.S.: now that I remember -- funniest thing happened with Masuda-man that
>      nate tuning. He decided it was interesting, and wanted to remember it.
>      Now, the guitar was connected to a small battery amp, a few feet away
>      from us. Mike quickly grabbed a small tape recorder in his bag and
>      asked me to play one string at a time, which I did very carefully and
>      letting ring. In the meantime Mike was taping the tuning... but none
>      realised he was picking the strings, not the amp!!! As soon as I had
>      finished we looked at each other, the light came in our mind and we
>      both started laughing rather histerically. Needless to say, the sample
>      was repeated, with the microphone pointed to the amp this time...

Remember--you had a cold, and I was tired from lack of sleep, so.... :)
Yes, usually at home, I have the guitar not plugged in, and the microphone
on the microcassette recorder is sensitive enought to pick up the sounds
off of the strings.  I forgot that the thing was plugged into the
Pignose... (yeah, right Mike)

Mike Masuda.

BTW, the Pignose is a great portable amp.  One knob controls volume
and fuzz (excellent fuzz).  Open it up, and you get a neat wah-wah effect
from the change in cavity size.  Ooh, I wonder how it will sound
with a microphone completely placed inside the box of the Pignose?
I'm going to have to try that out.  Fuzz-o-rama.  Leonard, you
have to check the Pignose out in your neck of the woods, just fer fun.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
 Like a shot, like a paparazzo picture gone to pot...
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Marco Olivotto, C.I.S.C.A. - Univ. degli Studi di Trento, POVO (TN) - ITALY
olivotto@itnvax.cineca.it                                 OLIVOTTO@ITNCISCA
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    Sorry, can't resist...                                                  74
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