Hand Carved Karimbu Instrument | Rhythmic Sound Ritual Tool

A karimbu is one of the lamellophones, the family of African instruments played by plucking tuned metal tongues with the thumbs. You will also see them sold as kalimbas or thumb pianos. The tongues are fixed over a hollow body, and the body is what gives each one its voice. Ours are made in Bali rather than in Africa, in the same workshops as the shakers and the frame drums.

This is the smaller of the two we carry, and the one with the deeper relief cut into the body. A smaller resonator gives a tighter, quicker note with less ring after it.

It is an easy instrument to start on. You can hold a pattern with your thumbs while your attention sits somewhere else, the way you would use a rattle or a drum, and that is what makes it useful in ritual rather than only in music.

Good to Know

Roughly 4 inches tall and 5.5 inches across. Made and finished by hand, so the carving, the finish and the exact tuning vary piece to piece. The tongues can be nudged in or out to shift a note if one sits wrong for you.

These are inexpensive handmade instruments rather than concert kalimbas. They arrive roughly in tune with themselves and not to concert pitch, which matters if you want to play one alongside something else.

Pair It With

The Coconut Karimbu is the larger one with a rounder, longer note. For rhythm rather than melody, the Labora Shaker or the Frog Guiro. More in sound.

If you are working out what a practice is meant to shift, our guide to five signs of blocked energy is a decent place to start.