| Name | Image | Tradition | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Esterilla |  | Colombia | The esterilla is a traditional percussion instrument from Colombia. The esterilla consists of long, narrow pieces of wood woven together in a similar fashion as a placemat. The instrument is played by either bending it or rubbing it against itself. |
| Fangxiang |  | China | The fangxiang (also fang xiang, fang hsiang; 方响 or 方響 in Chinese) is an ancient Chinese metallophone. The instrument consists of 16 tuned rectangular iron slabs laid in a frame in two rows. The slabs are struck with a hammer and played melodically. Each of the slabs is of the same length and width but they are of graduated thickness, with the thinner slabs producing lower tones and the thicker slabs producing higher tones. In ancient times, the fangxiang was a popular instrument in Chinese court music. It was introduced to Korea, where it is called banghyang (hangul: 방향; hanja: 方響) and is still used in the court music of Korea. The image shows a display in a museum of China. Two pieces of slabs were missing from the display. |
| Flexatone |  | United States | The flexatone is a modern percussion instrument (an indirectly struck idiophone) consisting of a small flexible metal sheet suspended in a wire frame ending in a handle. A wooden knob mounted on a strip of spring steel lies on each side of the metal sheet. 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. The player then shakes the instrument with a trembling movement which causes the beaters to strike the sides of the metal sheet. While shaking the handle, the musician makes a high or low-pitched sound due to the curve given to the blade by the pressure from his thumb. A vibrato is thus produced. |
| Gambang |  | Indonesia | A gambang, properly called a gambang kayu ('wooden gambang') is a xylophone-like instrument of Indonesian origin used in gamelan, with wooden bars as opposed to the metallic ones of the more typical metallophones in a gamelan. A type of wood known as berlian is normally used to make Gambang's bars. A wooden case is built to support these bars and to act as a resonator. Each Gambang has approximately 19 to 20 bars. The gambang is used in a number of gamelan ensembles. It is most notable in the Balinese gamelan Gambang. |
| Gandingan |  | Philippines | The gandingan (talking gongs) is a set of four large Philippine brass hanging-gongs used specifically by the Maguindanao as part of their kulintang ensemble. When integrated into the ensemble, it functions as a secondary melodic instrument after the main melodic instrument, the kulintang. When played solo, the gandingan allows fellow Maguindanao to communicate with each other, allowing them to send messages or warnings via long distances. Traditionally, women were the only ones allowed to play the gandingan. |
| Gangsa |  | Indonesia | A gangsa is a type of metallophone which is used in Balinese and Javanese Gamelan music. It consists of several tuned-metal bars which are hit with a mallet and each make a note of a different pitch. The gangsa is very similar to the gendér and the saron. |
| Ganza |  | Brazil | The ganzá, also called cholaho, is a Brazilian rattle used as a percussion instrument, especially in samba music. The ganza is cylindrically shaped, and can be either a hand-woven basket or a metal canister which is filled with beads, metal balls, pebbles, or other similar items. Those made from metal produce a particularly loud sound. |
| Gendér |  | Indonesia | A gendér is a type of metallophone used in Balinese and Javanese gamelan music. It consists of 10 to 14 tuned metal bars suspended over a tuned resonator of bamboo or metal, which are tapped with a padded wooden disk. Each key is a note of a different pitch, often extending a little more than two octaves. There are five notes per octave, so in the seven-note pélog scale, some pitches are left out according to the pathet. Most gamelans include three gendérs, one for slendro, one for pelog pathet nem and lima, and one for pelog pathet barang. |
| Ghatam |  | India | The ghatam is a percussion instrument, used in the Carnatic music of South India. It is an earthenware pot; the artist uses the fingers, thumbs, palms, and heels of the hands to strike the outer surface of the ghatam. An airy low-pitch bass sound, called gumki, is created by hitting the mouth of the pot with an open hand. The artist sometimes presses the mouth of the pot against their bare belly, which deepens the tone of the bass stroke, and is another way to produce the "gumki" sound. Different tones can be produced by hitting different areas of the pot with different parts of the hands. The ghatam usually accompanies a mridangam. |
| Ghungroo |  | India | A ghungroo (ghunguru) is a small metallic bell. Many of them strung together form ghungroos which is a musical accessory tied to the feet of classical Indian dancers. The sounds produced by ghungroos vary greatly in pitch depending on their metallic composition and size. Ghungroos serve to accentuate the rhythmic aspects of the dance and allow complex footwork to be heard by the audience. They are worn immediately above the ankle. |
| Glass Harmonica |  | Italy | The glass harmonica, also known as the glass armonica, hydrocrystalophone, or simply armonica (derived from "armonia", the Italian word for overtones) is a type of musical instrument that uses a series of glass bowls or goblets graduated in size to produce musical tones by means of friction. Because its sounding portion is made of glass, the glass harmonica is a crystallophone. The phenomenon of rubbing a wet finger around the rim of a wine goblet to produce tones is documented back to Renaissance times. |
| Glass Marimba |  | Brazil | The glass marimba is a crystallophone that is similar to the marimba, but has glass bars instead of wood bars. The bars, which the performer strikes with padded mallets, are perched on a glass box to provide the necessary resonance. Glass marimbas are utilised by the Brazilian percussion ensemble, Uakti. Uakti is known for using custom-made instruments, built by the Uakti group itself. The thickness and length of each bar determines the pitch. The longer and thinner a bar is - the lower its pitch will be. |
| Glockenspiel |  | Germany | The glockenspiel (German, "play of bells", also known as orchestra bells and, in its portable form, bell lira or bell lyre) is a musical instrument in the percussion family. It is similar to the xylophone, in that it has tuned bars laid out in a fashion resembling a piano keyboard. The xylophone's bars are wooden, while the glockenspiel's are metal, thus making it a metallophone. Glockenspiels are still quite popular and appear in almost all genres of music ranging from hip hop to jazz. |
| Gong |  | Indonesia | A gong is an East Asian musical instrument that takes the form of a metal disc which is hit with a mallet. The photo shows a gong collection used in a Gamelan ensemble of Indonesia. A gamelan typically features a variety of instruments such as metallophones, xylophones, drums, and gongs; bamboo flutes, bowed and plucked strings, and vocalists may also be included. |
| Gong Chime |  | Thailand | A gong chime is a generic term for a set of small, high-pitched bossed pot gongs. The gongs are ordinarily placed in order of pitch, placed upright with the boss upward on cords held in a low wooden frame, often in order of ascending pitch. The frames can be rectangular or circular (the latter are sometimes called "gong circles"), and may have one or two rows of gongs. They are an important instrument in a large number of Southeast Asian musical ensembles. |
| Guacharaca |  | Colombia | Guacharaca is a musical percussion instrument usually made out of the cane-like trunk of a small palm tree. The guacharaca itself consists of a tube with ridges carved into its outer surface with part of its interior hollowed out, giving it the appearance of a tiny, notched canoe. It is played with a fork composed of hard wire fixed into a wooden handle. The 'guacharaquero' (guacharaca player) scrapes the fork along the instrument's surface to create its characteristic scratching sound. A typical guacharaca is about as thick as a broomstick and as long as a violin. |
| Güira |  | Dominican Republic | A güira is a percussion instrument from the Dominican Republic, generally used in merengue, bachata, and its subgenres, that sounds like a maraca or hi-hat but in fact is a sheet of metal-- in practice, often from a five gallon oil can-- evenly perforated with a nail, shaped into a cylinder or torpedo-like shape, and played with a stiff brush, similar to the Cuban güiro, but more serrated. In merengue, the güira is brushed steadily on the downbeat with a "and-a" thrown in at certain points, or played in more complex patterns that generally mark the time. Modern cumbia also sometimes features a güira. |
| Güiro |  | Cuba | The güiro is a percussion instrument consisting of an open-ended, hollow gourd with parallel notches cut in one side. It is played by rubbing a wooden stick along the notches to produce a ratchet-like sound. The güiro is commonly used in Latin-American music, and plays a key role in the typical cumbia rhythm section. |
| Gyil |  | Ghana | The gyil is a xylophone-like instrument made of wood and gourds. It is a pentatonic percussion instrument, common to Ghana, Burkina Faso and Côte d'Ivoire. It is the primary traditional musical instrument used by the Dagara, an African ethnic group. The instrument is made with a wooden frame, calabash gourds with spider web silk covering small holes in the gourds to produce a buzzing sound, antelope sinew and leather for the fastenings and a red hardwood called liga for the keys. |
| Handbell |  | United States | A handbell is a bell designed to be rung by hand. To ring a handbell, a ringer grasps the bell by its slightly flexible handle - traditionally made of leather, but often now made of plastic - and moves the wrist to make the hinged clapper inside the bell strike. The bells used in American handbell choirs are almost always English handbells. "English handbells" is a reference to a specific type of handbells, not to the country of origin. The image shows members of Slater Elementary School’s girls bell group, 2004. |
| Hi-hat |  | United States | A hi-hat, or hihat, is a type of cymbal and stand used as a typical part of a drum kit by percussionists in disco, jazz, rock and roll, and other forms of contemporary popular music. The hi-hat consists of two crash cymbals that are mounted on a stand one on top of the other and clashed together using a pedal on the stand. A narrow metal shaft or "hi-hat rod" runs through both cymbals into a hollow tube and connects to the pedal. The top cymbal is connected to the rod with a "hi-hat clutch" while the bottom cymbal remains stationary resting on the hollow tube. When the "footplate" of the pedal is pressed, the top cymbal crashes onto the bottom cymbal (closed hi-hat). When released, the top cymbal returns to its original position. |
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