kazoo

a musical toy consisting of a tube that is open at both ends and has a hole in the side covered with parchment or membrane, which produces a buzzing sound when the performer hums into one end.

So the expression “out of the kazoo” means that the person produced the thing out of nowhere.

On this page you'll find 8 synonyms, antonyms, and words related to kazoo, such as: french harp, harmonica, harmonicon, harp, mouth bow, and mouth harp.

A kazoo is a very simple musical instrument, made up of a hollow pipe with a hole in it. The hole is covered by a membrane that vibrates, resulting in a buzzing sound when people sing, speak or hum into the pipe. People have been making and playing kazoos for years.

A kazoo is especially great for practicing phonation. (the process by which the vocal folds produce certain. sounds through quasi-periodic vibration).

When you hum into the kazoo, vibrations from your vocal cords travel through the tube, vibrating the air molecules. The waxed-paper membrane that on the other end of the tube creates additional vibration, amplifying the sound. The sound you make with your voice has a main pitch.

The History of the Kazoo These instruments were called mirlitons, or “onion flutes.” A popular anecdote suggests that Alabama Vest, a formerly enslaved person residing in Macon, Georgia, designed the modern kazoo in 1840 in collaboration with German clock manufacturer Thaddeus Von Clegg.

Kazoos are considered wind instruments. However, they're not really played by blowing into them. Simply blowing into a kazoo will make no sound. Instead, kazoo players actually hum into the kazoo to make music.

The History of the Kazoo These instruments were called mirlitons, or “onion flutes.” A popular anecdote suggests that Alabama Vest, a formerly enslaved person residing in Macon, Georgia, designed the modern kazoo in 1840 in collaboration with German clock manufacturer Thaddeus Von Clegg.

When the kazoo is sang or spoken into, the wax membrane vibrates, altering the voice into a nasally, vibrating sound. Although the pitch of the kazoo can be changed simply by changing the pitch of one's voice, partially covering the membrane can introduce a kazooist to a wide range of noises.

The kazoo was invented by an American named Alabama Vest and made to his specifications by a German clock master named Thaddeus Von Clegg in Macon, Georgia back in the 1840's. A traveling salesman by the name of Emil Sorg brought the idea of manufacturing metal kazoos to Western New York in about 1912.

Kazoos are wind instruments called mirlitons, which use a vibrating membrane to make sound. Hundreds of years ago, African mirlitons were made from cow horns with spider eggshells for the vibrating membrane. Alabama Vest, an African-American hailing from Macon, Georgia, invented the modern day kazoo in the 1840's.