LP Latin Percussion Flex-a-Tone Standard LP1-5

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I argue therefore that the flexatone does not sound very European – or out of place – within an often Africa-focussed - and at least African-influenced genre - like Reggae. In this stage, other percussion instruments, the said idiophones, were a kind of a side-path, though I practiced with it, and had quite some of these idiophones, using them and recording with them, alongside drums. Oddly, Hitler’s Nazi regime in Germany banned the Flexatone, along with other instruments (cowbells, brushes), for being (I quote) “alien to the German spirit” or “Aryan musicality”. Often its use is something between (rhythmic, atmospheric, melodic), due to its inherent flexibility (as other percussion instruments). Relatively most of these idiophones are “struck” in one way or the other, and on one of these I am going to focus now: the “Flexatone” (also spelled as Flex-a-tone).

The player holds the flexatone in one hand with the palm around the wire frame and the thumb on the free end of the spring steel. Let’s say that the definition of percussion in this case is all rhythmic instruments outside the (trap) drum kit/set, so commonly used now in modern pop music. Added to this, however, are two wooden balls on either side, thus sounding when the “metal blade” as such is pressed/struck by thumb, combining thus a musical/singing saw with bell/glockenspiel-like sounds, with glissando (or trembling, quivering) effects. Just as one more possible sound and instrument available for these old- and new-generation of Jamaican percussionists.Because of the size, it may be easier when using with children if an adult holds the Flexatone while the child applies the pressure to the blade as their hand will be too small to hold it and play it. The cellist in Sofia Gubaidulina's The Canticle of the Sun (1998) plays a bowed flexatone before the final section. A live-band focus, often including a percussion set, was never fully abandoned within reggae (with veteran artists like Burning Spear, Congos, Mighty Diamonds, Abyssinians a.

While the instrument has a very limited dynamic range, volume can be controlled by how vigorously or delicately the player shakes the Flexatone. In playing the flexatone, the performer must hold the flexatone in one hand, with the palm around the instrument’s wireframe and the thumb on the free side of the spring steel. It is usually employed as an abstract effect, since it is notoriously difficult to play specified pitches with any accuracy—the thumb pressure to sharpen or flatten is extremely subtle and difficult to gauge. Additionally, the flexatone is notated using tremolo lines to indicate the shaking of the instrument, as well as the desired direction of the glissando line.The metal plate of the flexatone is hit alternatively on each side by wooden or rubber beaters or balls that are attached to a clock spring.

Hans Werner Henze also used this instrument in his opera entitled The Elegy for Young Lovers in 1961. The 1920s is of course, compared to the ancient drums, scrapers, xylophones, shakers, bells, or wood blocks, relatively new. Some reggae percussionists (before and now) also like rattle sounds, such as from the “vibra-slap” instrument.The Wikipedia article on the Flexatone describes it as one such later invention, patented first in the 1920s in Britain and soon after the US, and used early on as “funny sound effect”, for theatrical use rather, but also in jazz music circles. It cannot be pretended that its scope or range are wide, but such as it is, it is quite irreplaceable. Of course, modified and limited, it still echoes here and there such ancient musical bows, and other African string and metal instruments with “glissando/gliding”–like sounds.