The 8-Note Kalimba
in Japanese
Akebono Tuning
Some instruments, such as the piano, or
guitar, or trumpet, give you all the notes you
might ever need for any song. Most songs
will use only about half the notes you have
on those instruments, leaving the rest of the
notes as a mine field of “wrong notes” you
must try to avoid.
The kalimba, an ancient African instrument,
takes another approach: it gives you all the
notes you need for a certain song, or a certain scale. The scale used here is the Japanese
Akebono scale, the same scale that traditional Japanese songs such as Sakura are written
in. Now, new age artists use the Akebono
scale to bring a sense of the exotic into their
music, and you can do the same.
31
Eb
C
5
2
G
1
D
C
2
6D
3Ab
Eb
The low note “1” is the root note - this is a C
minor scale. The root chord is made up of
1 and 3- (the minor 3rd) on the right and 5,
1, 3- on the left. You can strum those notes
together, or play them one at a time in an arpeggio. Experiment with going to the 6- (the
minor 6th) as a substitute for the 5 note - this
will bring tension into the music which is
resolved when you go back to playing the 5,
probably along with some of the other notes
in the 1 3- 5 root chord. When playing melodies, the 2 is a connecting note between the 1
and the 3-, but the 2 and the 5 notes also go
together as a chord.
You can see a kalimba played in the Akebono
tuning by going to YouTube and searching
for akebono kalimba.
You can learn more about the kalimba at:
www.KalimbaMagic.com