DINOSAUR AND SHAKER ARMS

These instruments involve maraca-like shakers (pellet rattles) which produce recognizable pitches. They are mounted on springy steel arms. Once one of the arms is set in motion, its swaying sounds the shaker with each swing. The swinging can be made faster or slower either by means of movable weights on the arms, or by varying the active arm length. In the dinosaur (small photo above) there are two shaker types: aluminum and wood. In both, the air resonance pitch is tuned to agree with the idiophonic shaker pitch. An added bonus: In making this instrument I produced a lot of extra tuned shakers in wood, metal and bamboo. These, having been left unmounted, are very nice to hand out to groups of people for hocketing jams.

The instrument heard in the audio clip is the dinosaur, accompanied by unpitched shakers and a rainstick. In the video, one of several instruments shown is individual shakers like those on the dinosaur being used, hand-held, as hocketing instruments.