Folk and Ethnic Musical Instruments

Players of lip vibrated instruments (also known as brass instruments) produce their sound by making thier lips vibrate while blowing into the instrument. Trumpet, french horn, trombone, bugle, cornet and tuba all fall into this category. Among the ethnic instruments using this approach are the  didjedridu and a large variety of natural horns. As only a subset of these instruments is actually made from brass, the term lip vibrated instrument seems more appropriate.

Simple lip vibrated instruments have existed since many thousands of years on all continents. The earliest forms were made from animal horns and sea shells. Most of these instruments are natural horns and lack options to alter the pitch other than by overblowing. Examples of comtemporary animal horn instruments include the shofar from Israel, the en gombe from Uganda, the rwa-dun from Tibet and the Indian shringa, singha and kombu. Examples of conch shell instruments include the shank or shankam from India, the dun-dkar or dung-dkar from Tibet, the horagai or hora from Japan, the faluo or hai lo from China and a large variety of instruments from the Pacific, like the davui from Fiji, the tapae from Vanuatu or the kele a from Tonga.

Most manufactured horns, made from bamboo, wood, gourd, bone, ivory, clay or metal, are inspired by animal-horns and conch-shells. In India the archaic shringa or kombu evolved into a variety of metallic horns like the C-shaped timiri kombu and the bari kombu, the S-shaped nagphani or bargu and the straight kahala. Other contemporary horns include the alphorn from Central Europe, the borija from the Balkans, the didjedridu from aboriginal Australia, the arupepe from Uganda (all wooden) the rkan-dun or rkang-gling from Tibet (bone), the waza from Sudan (gourd), the pu ohe from Hawaii, the vaksen from Haiti, the pepato from Indonesia (all bamboo) and the potuto from Peru (clay), among many others.

Examples of non-Western lip vibrated instruments with addtional sophisticated pitch control options - like the bas from Northern India which features fingerholes -  are relatively rare.