Listen to the tambourine
Tip: press play to see the sound's live frequency spectrum in blue over the waveform.
How the tambourine makes its sound
In the Hornbostel–Sachs system, which classifies instruments by how they produce sound, the tambourine belongs to the shaken and scraped idiophones: the body is shaken, scraped or split – rattles, maracas and guiros.
More broadly it is one of the idiophones, where the solid body of the instrument itself vibrates, without strings or a stretched membrane.
Players shape its sound through technique and materials; the resonating body filters the raw vibration, boosting some harmonics and damping others.
From Wikipedia
The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though some variants may not have a head. Tambourines are often used with regular percussion sets. They can be mounted, for example on a stand as part of a drum kit (and played with drum sticks), or they can be held in the hand and played by tapping, hitting, or shaking the instrument.
Tambourines come in many shapes with the most common being circular. It is found in many forms of music: Albanian folk music, Arabic folk music, Balkan folk music, Israeli folk music, Turkish folk music, Greek folk music, Italian folk music, French folk music, classical music, Spanish folk music, Persian music, samba, gospel music, pop music, country music, and rock music.
Other shaken and scraped idiophones
Maraca
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Music box
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Sistrum
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Angklung
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Jingle bell
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Ratchet
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Güiro
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Cabasa
Shaken and scraped idiophones
Frequently asked questions
What does a tambourine sound like?
Listen to 1 recording on this page. As one of the shaken and scraped idiophones, its sound comes from the way the body is shaken, scraped or split.
What type of instrument is the tambourine?
It is classified as shaken and scraped idiophones (Hornbostel–Sachs 112.1).
Sources & credits
- Headless tambourine by Michielderoo – CC0 1.0 · Wikimedia Commons
- Wikidata Q193666 – CC0
- Wikipedia: Tambourine – CC BY-SA 4.0
- Image – Public domain