Set of 10 Buzzers

Description

While most western ears appreciate the clear, pure kalimba tones, in Africa it is a different story. The distortion of the buzzers was an essential part of the African sound. Essentially every traditional kalimba had some sort of buzzers.

When Andrew Tracey brought the African Tuned Karimba into the AMI Hugh Tracey instrument lineup in the 1980s, he decided upon these brass compression mountings for a robust buzzer solution. They slip onto 4 mm width kalimba tines. They sit between the bridge and the “Z bracket”, and to get them into that space, you slip them into the tine, and then lift the tine off the bridge to let the buzzer slide past the bridge. (See the Video in the Video Tab.)

Generally, it is not possible to get these buzzers on all 17 tines of a karimba, so typically they are put onto the nine lower row tines – the “every other tine” approach to the buzzers gives the buzzers enough space. Why do we give 10 tines and not 9? In case you lose one.