Kalimba: The African Thumb Piano, Its History and Sound

What a kalimba is

A kalimba is a thumb piano, also called a finger piano: a row of metal tines of different lengths fixed to a wooden board or box, which the player holds in both hands and plucks with the thumbs. Each tine sounds one note, the longer ones lower. Musicians call this family of instruments lamellophones. Many kalimbas have a hollow body or a resonator that makes the sound louder and longer.

The kalimba has a quiet, bell-like sound, and a beginner can play a tune within minutes because the notes follow a regular pattern: on the common layout the longest, lowest tine sits in the middle and the higher notes alternate to the left and right. That simplicity is why it has spread from Africa to music classes, living rooms and streaming playlists around the world.

Kalimba or mbira?

The two words overlap, and sources use them loosely. The simplest rule:

Mbira is the Shona name for a family of traditional instruments in Zimbabwe, with their own tunings, repertoire and ceremonial role. See our page on the mbira.
Kalimba is the name given to a modern instrument that Hugh Tracey adapted from them for wider use, and by extension to the thumb pianos sold under that name today.

So every kalimba is a descendant of the mbira, but a kalimba is not the instrument played at a Shona ceremony.

Hugh Tracey and the name

Hugh Tracey (1903–1977) was a British-born ethnomusicologist who worked in southern Africa and recorded thousands of pieces of music there. In 1954 he founded the International Library of African Music, now at Rhodes University in South Africa, and the African Musical Instruments company, which made African and African-derived instruments, including the instrument that became known as the Hugh Tracey kalimba. He modelled it on the Shona mbira nyunga nyunga and took the name kalimba from an old term for instruments of this family.

Accounts differ on details: some describe his first model as having 15 tines tuned to G major, others a 17-tine model, which is the size most modern kalimbas follow. Tracey's instruments reached a wide audience through the 1950s and 1960s; later, popular records such as Earth, Wind & Fire's "Kalimba Story" in the 1970s brought the sound to listeners who had never heard an mbira.

Thumb pianos across Africa

Instruments of this kind are played across much of sub-Saharan Africa under many names: mbira in Zimbabwe, sanza and likembe in central Africa, among others. Each region has its own sizes, tunings and uses. The earliest European description of one that we know of is from 1586, when the Portuguese missionary João dos Santos described an ambira he saw among the Shona. For the West African instruments that sit beside it in many ensembles, see African musical instruments.

How a kalimba is tuned

Most kalimbas sold today are tuned to a diatonic scale — the white notes of a piano — so that any tune in that key can be played without adjusting the tines. C major is very common for modern kalimbas; Tracey's own model was tuned to G major. Because the tines slide in the board, they can be re-tuned by tapping them a little further in or out; a small tuning hammer does it.

Starting to play

Choose a standard layout. A 17-tine kalimba in C major is what most tutorials and printed tabs assume.
Learn from numbered tabs. Beginner music for the kalimba writes each tine as a number, so you can play from the first day without reading staff notation.
Hold it with the thumbs on top. Rest the instrument in both palms and let the thumbs do the plucking; the fingers support it underneath.
Start with slow, familiar tunes before trying the interlocking patterns of Zimbabwean mbira music.

Questions

What is a kalimba?

A small African-derived thumb piano: metal tines on a resonating body, played with the thumbs.

Is the kalimba the same as the mbira?

No. The mbira is the traditional Shona instrument; the kalimba is the modern instrument Hugh Tracey adapted from it. They share a design but not a tradition.

Is the kalimba an African instrument?

Yes. Its design comes from lamellophones played for centuries in Africa, especially the mbira of Zimbabwe. The word kalimba and the instruments sold under it are twentieth-century.

How many keys does a kalimba have?

Commonly 17 on a standard model, though smaller travel and children's kalimbas have fewer.

Is the kalimba easy to learn?

The first tunes are easy, which is why it is popular with beginners. Playing the layered patterns of traditional mbira music takes years.