About KALIMBA:
kalimba is a lamellaphone idiophone inspired by indigenous Bantu African instruments and manufactured in the Republic of South Africa.
The indigenous kalimba is used mostly for personal entertainment or dance music, but can also be played in bira spirit possession ceremonies.
Hugh Tracey, an ethnomusicologist working with this tradition, adapted the original kalimba mbira into the kalimba pictured here for a Western, non-African audience. Information included with the instrument states "The Kalimba is a new musical instrument with an old history, the latest member of the African family of instruments known by names such as Mbira, Likembe, Chisanzi, Endongo, Timbrh, Marimbula ... It came into being because its originator, Hugh Tracey, after a lifetime's work of recording and studying African music, wanted to introduce this fascinating, companionable and uniquely African instrument to the rest of the world, adapted to the Western scale so that people everywhere could appreciate it.
Workshop-made today by African craftsmen, using Sheffield steel with mubvamaropa, the resonant hardwood traditionally used for the Mbira in central and southern Africa, the Kalimba embodies Hugh Tracey's improvements in design and performance. Several imitations already exist; what Thi are holding is the original, made in Africa." This instrument has no associated tradition or context of use. Its target audience is cosmopolitans who are perhaps attracted to it because it indexes