Brighten Your Day with Kazoo

Yesterday my daughter came from the orchestra rehearsal with a tiny piece of plastic instrument – kazoo. Young players got those apparently to broaden their musicality. What a great idea!

While I had been driving my daughter home, she showed me, giggling, her new music instrument. But I couldn’t make her use it for more than a one tone ‘presentation’. So I thought that she wouldn’t dare to play it, as it requires using players own voice, what she does only when accompanied with other singers in a choir setting.

The funny sounding little instrument apparently couldn’t be left untried by the girl. But it was a real surprise, when she brought it the next day in the morning, for our long ride to the school. And not just that! 

She immediately started playing well known melodies, classical hits, and notoriously overussed pieces from her ten years of music education.  Constantly laughing, she asked her brother for suggestions, so that they could play and sing together. 

It was a fantastic 40 minutes spent in the morning snowy traffic of Toronto. Kids had a blast making music right on the spot. I was surprised, how little was needed to completely change the gloomy athmosphere of the morning. 

And as I’d learned later, it didn’t stop there. Encouraged by the morning commute success, the daughter has apparently decided to try it with her classmates. With a similar positive result. 

So here is my suggestion to you – if you can ‘hum’ a few melodies and are brave enough to do it infront of your family members, even friends, or colleagues, try sometimes to brighten their day with music. Invest a few dollars in a kazoo, doesn’t matter whether plastic or metal (that one is better though), and invite your listeners to participate either by suggesting new melodies, or even humming with you. You will be surprised about the outcome!

Photo: YouTube screen grab