How to Make Musical Instruments Out of Natural Materials

Making musical instruments out of natural materials will allow you to explore your creative side and create music with friends and family. Whether you choose to make an instrument out of wood or bamboo, you can easily learn to make chimes and flutes. Chimes provide the simplest musical instruments to create and play and provide a legitimate route for those who would like to play non-melodic instruments. Flutes require a greater degree of skill in both playing and creation. 

Flutes 

Step 1 Purchase a large stalk of bamboo about 8 inches long.

Step 2 Place the bamboo stalk in a vise with the end of the bamboo stalk facing up.
Step 3 Use a hammer and a 1/2-inch wide nail to hammer through one end of the fibrous material of the bamboo stalk. Do not hammer all the way through the stalk. Leave about 1 inch at the other end, so that the flute remains closed. When you hammer the material inside, the stalk will separate, leaving the stalk hollow.

Step 4 Hammer a hole1 inch from the open end of the stalk using the 1/8-inch nail. Then create three more holes 1 inch apart from each other. Move down the flute another 2 inches and hammer one more hole. This will be the hole you blow over to make a sound. Use your fingers to cover the other holes and change the pitch. 

Chimes 

Step 1 Find six wooden sticks between 3 and 6 inches in length. You can use small branches from a fallen tree.

Step 2 Break two of the sticks so that they measure approximately 3 inches across. Position the sticks perpendicular to each other so that they form a "+" sign. Tie the string around the two sticks and continue wrapping around the sticks in a criss-cross pattern to ensure that the two sticks bind together tightly. Cut the string and tie it off on one of the sticks. This will create your arms to hold the chimes. 

Step 3 Cut 4 3-inch pieces of string. Tie one end of the string to the tops of each stick, and then tie the other end to the perpendicular arms you made in Step 2.

Step 4 Hang your chime by attaching a hook to the top of the arms or tying a piece of string to the arms and letting it hang from a tree, porch or windowsill.