Musical Instrument Design: Practical Information for Instrument Design

This is such a treasure! Every page has a neat idea with excellent illustrations and Mr Hopkin provides deep knowledge about sound with simple approaches to handling materials. For hobbyists it's an inspiration resources and for professionals the book compiles useful tables and formulae.

This is probably my favourite of Bart Hopkin's books. It is "The one to get". But they are all worth getting. I felt this exposed me to lots of strange new ideas and possibilities. I love pretty much everything Bart Hopkin does, his books and music. He is a very interesting chappie. If you like experimenting, and strange new sounds, and want to learn more about it, he's the go-to guy.... ...as well as Harry Partch's book "Genesis of a Music". ................ [this part of the "review" I'm just copying+pasting from my other reviews on Bart Hopkin books, since I think I have pretty much the same sentiment for all of his books, and I'm LAZY with multiple reviews (: ] This book is great, and opens up a lot of possibilities for new sounds. It is very imaginative! All books by Bart Hopkin that I own are excellent. They are all 5 star books for me. They all open up beautiful and strange new possibilities for sounds. The ones I own are - Musical Instrument design - Experimental Musical Instruments back issues on CD - Funny Noises for the Connoisseur - Plosives and Aerophones - Getting a bigger sound - Nice Noise [written with another author, Yuri Landman] - I own a few of Bart's albums I think the only book I don't own is the "Wind Chimes" one, since I'm not really a "wind chime" kind of guy, but I'm beginning to wonder if maybe I should just grab it anyway, in case it is even a fraction as interesting as the other books. I don't know, though.... wind chimes..... I might give it a go..... Thanks for putting this stuff together!

This book explains the physics of musical instruments with an eye toward making experimental musical instruments. The physics content is practical and non mathematical. The book is supplemented with a number of hands on demonstrations. These demonstrations require easily obtainable supplies (such as balloons, copper pipes, Styrofoam ice chests and small pieces of wood and wire) and only a few common tools (such as wire cutters, a hammer or a saw). Neither a shop nor power tools are necessary. If you are the experimental kind, and you wonder what awesome timbres you might discover if you made your own musical instruments, this is the book for you. If your interest is in making traditional musical instruments you will be disappointed. Advanced construction techniques are not covered. That is not what this book is about.

If what you want to do is make a guitar or violin from scratch, there are better books than this one. However, if you want to understand how and why musical instruments of all kinds are built the way they are, this book has you covered. There's information on instruments that are percussive, stringed (both plucked and bowed), and blown into. Most useful are the tips on how to get these things tuned in such a way that they are useful for making music. Check out the "windworld" web site for some examples of the experimental instruments Hopkin has created. The book contains information on building materials (with tips on where to get them), music and sound theory, and some history when relevant to an instrument he is trying to emulate. It's certainly not exhaustive, but gives you just enough to get your creativity flowing. I would have liked to see more illustrations and or photographs showing the assembly of some of these instruments, but that's not to say that the book isn't already full of illustrations. I just want more. One other thing to note is that this isn't a book about making toys for kids. No pie plate tambourines here. This is 175 pages of serious information and ideas, a bargain at this price.

Great book when you need to go deeper into the workings of a instrument of your choice. Just chocked full of great how to information and how to knowledge for making a instrument.

Excellent book

This book is full of the "why's" if you happen to be thinking in tinkering with musical instrument building. At least that was my case anyways. Because although I am somewhat knowledgeable in terms of acoustics physics this goes from there and describes how the design affects the resulting sound with perfect teaching skills. I wish I could have that sense of value when teaching... not too technical and difficult but without leaving aside any important piece of information regarding the subject. From then on one can go and find more specific and technical sources if needed. But again, this is an excellent starting point for any person interested in experimenting with instrument making.

This book is a fascinating read. I’m a luthier, I build some conventional stuff but I like to explore some original concepts too and this is a great guide for experimentation with musical instruments outside of my training. Such a great read with a great style of writing that inspires me to build stuff!

Thank you Bart :-)

This book is amazing and super inspiring! If you are interested in building instruments and sound machines, this is the book you need to have!

Possibly the best book of its kind. Full of useful stuff about homemade instruments, and also gives a good account of how instruments work for the layman. Can easily be dipped into also; you don't need to read this from cover to cover to get the benefit.

Very useful and interesting information, covers theory surrounding sound in a very user-friendly way and provides examples of instruments others have designed to get you started in instrument construction and study from a practical, tactile standpoint rather than a purely theoretical approach. I am glad that it is now available as an eBook as it makes it much more accessible than purchasing and shipping a print version of the text.

Explica bem didaticamente como cada instrumento funciona e a física por trás.