Music education always carries the same image: that of a child playing the piano, violin or even guitar.
But music is far from being limited to these three instruments. When offering an instrument to your child, you should not be confronted with the disadvantages of playing them.
These include the initial cost, of course, but also the upkeep and private lessons they require.
Music, which is so important for the child's cognitive development [1], should not cost a large budget.
Therefore, the tongue drum offers itself as a real alternative, based on decisive advantages:
- an inexpensive instrument,
- a renunciation of accompanied learning,
- a more joyful learning for the child,
- a lack of maintenance,
- a time saving.
We will analyze in detail all these advantages in comparison with classical instruments such as the piano, violin or guitar.
Is the Tongue Drum cheaper than other instruments?
The Tongue Drum saves you one very important thing: you don't have to weigh between buying an instrument or a car.
While not every instrument costs 250,000 euros, the acquisition cost is not the only cost involved.
Much lower acquisition costs
Don't hesitate any longer about whether to invest in the stock market or buy your child a musical instrument - do both.
The tongue drum is cheaper than a piano.
Have you ever wondered how much a piano costs? Between 600 and 10 000 euros, which takes you from almost mediocre quality to high quality. We are not even talking about a grand piano, whose prices range from 4,000 euros to over 100,000 euros.
Here we have only talked about the cost and not yet about the space that such an instrument occupies in a house or, even worse, in an apartment. When it comes to your child starting to play the piano in a music school and ending up spending his life on the station piano, ...
The tongue drum is cheaper than the violin.
Now what about the violin or guitar, which have less of these space concerns? With violins, let's not lie to ourselves, they are available for 80 euros. But at this price you will very quickly get to a higher level.
Because not only is the sound anything but fabulous, but as a beginner you'll also quickly wonder if such banging isn't punishable by law. So a decent violin costs at least 400 euros, not including bow, transport box and rosin. We don't want to tell you about the top class for almost 300,000 euros.
The tongue drum is cheaper than a guitar.
Let's move on to our last instrument, the guitar. Like the violin, it occupies a respectable place. You can keep it in a corner or even hang it on the wall. As for the price, again it looks different.
Although you can find guitars on Amazon for 40 euros, it is not certain that the child will go far with such a device, unless you do not live near the landfill. Expect rather a good 500 euros, with an upper limit of 4000 euros for the very high price range.
How much does a tongue drum cost?
A tongue drum costs between 60 euros and 800 euros.
The Tongue Drum is a combination of two gas cylinder necks developed by a visionary American named Dennis Havlena. An instrument that can produce incredible tones over two octaves with breathtaking accuracy and subtlety.
No private lessons
Undeniably, the Tongue Drum for kids outshines pianos, violins and other guitars. Why is that? Because it can be played without frustration:
- Frustration from wrong notes,
- Frustration from the looks of others,
- frustration of ridicule.
Isn't that exactly what kept us away from musical instruments when we were young? We all remember flute lessons in middle school: the epitome of aversion to music theory.
With a piano, violin or guitar comes the indispensable private lessons that cost between 50 and 100 euros per session. Considering that you need at least one lesson a week, that's 200 euros spent every month.
With the Tongue Drum, these expenses are eliminated. Your child does not need individual lessons to play the drum. No particular posture of the instrument or body position is required.
The child will naturally position the tongue drum on his lap or place it in front of him. Producing sounds by hitting the mallets on the Tongue Drum is just as intuitive.
The Tongue Drum is therefore first and foremost an instrument of creative freedom, of the child's inspirations and inclinations. The tongue drum saves the authoritarian, traumatizing teacher who inhibits passion and establishes a mechanical style of playing in the child.
No maintenance costs
A musical instrument usually comes with a lot of maintenance costs. The piano goes out of tune and requires the services of a piano tuner. A string breaks and it's off to the piano maker or piano repairman for a proper repair.
If the strings of your violin suddenly loosen or break because you tuned it incorrectly or are overtired, you need to go to the luthier. The same goes for the guitar, which faces the same problems as the violin.
Not to mention the danger that humidity poses to the wood of these extremely delicate instruments. The exact opposite is the reed drum.
The reed drum is the instrument of freedom par excellence:
- Robustness,
- lightness,
- resilience.
These are the three adjectives that best describe this beautiful instrument, which fits perfectly into our century; a century in which people want to be able to take their favorite items anywhere and play them everywhere.
Whether on the bank of a river, on a mountain top or in a tree, the reed drum can be taken anywhere and in any weather.
A time saver
You are probably wondering what we mean by this. A time saving of what? We will tell you:
- a time saving in tuning,
- a time saving in learning.
As far as tuning is concerned, there is none. The tongue drum comes to your home sounding just right, and it will continue to sound right for decades to come.
For this very reason, it is quick to learn. With the Tongue Drum, the note doesn't change if you hit half an inch before or after where you aim.
It's not a stringed instrument that squeaks, whistles, or sounds wrong because your finger was 0.3 millimeters away from the exact right spot or the pad of your finger grazed the neighboring string.
You'll be able to play reed drum before ten years have passed, that's guaranteed.
To sum up, the tongue drum has nothing but advantages compared to conventional instruments. Among the general public, Tongue Drum is still unknown because it is only 16 years old, but it is definitely gaining popularity.
Invest in your child's future now, at a reasonable price and with stunning results.
Buy a tongue drum now.
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[1] Music training for the development of speech segmentation, François, Chobert u.a., 23. September 2013, doi: 10.1093/cercor/bhs180.
Externer Link: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/22784606/
