I will be purchasing a 5.0 marimba very soon, and am curious to get some thoughts from everybody on various brands. The four I'm considering are DeMorrow, Malletech, Kori, and Marimba One. I have played on examples of all the brands and have found them all to have different strengths/weaknesses, but all sound good, if not the same.

I read a post from last month from somebody who was just starting the marimba and wanted some mallet advice. I have found that the Inaki Sebastian mallets (distributed by Black Swamp Percussion) to be very nice. They are a little on the light side, but have a good tone without a lot of mallet contact noise. (Any hard mallet on the low end of a rosewood marimba with have some whack) My only complaint with them is that they use wool yarn, which is why they sound really nice, but they're not the most durable mallet heads. The Innovative Percussion William Moersch and Mark Ford series' also sound really nice, the softer versions roll very nicely, but I don't like the lacquered finish. (I use Pro-Mark stick wrap on the lower 5 inches of my mallets anyway, I'm a Stevens grip player) Malletech mallets are nice too.

OK, so, this post is getting long, but there as been some discussions about Two Mexican Dances and Velocities. David Hall has a CD out, titled "Saudacao", with both of those recorded as well as the Rosauro concerto.

kg

Kris,

Check this out for good advice on instruments:
http://malletjazz.com/database/

Hope that helps!

-Matt

Hi Kris -

I recommend both the Malletech and Marimba One 5 octave instruments. They are both superbly crafted instruments. I have never played on a DeMorrow or a Kori, so i won't be able to help out with info regarding those 2 instruments.

I have performed on a Malletech and Marimba One on several occassions and have been very satisfied with the feedback from both instruments. Marimba One is perfect for playing modern repertoire. i love the deep, dark lurking bass sound of a Marimba One. Malletech is also good for playing modern rep and any of the Stevens classical transcriptions {Bach, albums for the young etc.}plus the bass register is very satisfying musically.

As i said earlier, they are both superb instruments, but if your looking to save some money, i would go with the Marimba One. The last time i checked out the prices for both 5 octave instruments, the Marimba One was a couple thousand dollars cheaper than the Malletech. 10,000 as supposed to 15,000 i believe. If you do wind up getting the malletech, you won't be disappointed, trust me.

Best of luck in your studies.

Sincerely, Lon Stetz

The Malletech Marimba is a fine looking instrument, the frame is one of the best out there. The real drawback to the instrument is the bars. The workmanship is decent on them but they do not go through an initial visual inspection (most manufacturers throw away cracked bars before they do any work on them) and therefore end up with many large checks and cracks. They usually don't effect the sound much to start but these cracks in time open up and can cause serious problems. They also make the bars one instrument at a time and therefore do not balance them well (some bars ring longer than others). In contrast when a company like Musser puts an instrument together they have fifty of each bar sitting on the shelf and if a bar rings longer or shorter than the rest of the set they simply grab another and another until they find a good balance.

Marimba One is excellent in all workmanship, the only thing people question is the oval resonators. I personally have no problem with them.

I've only played one Demorrow instrument and was very impressed by the sound, the frame was a custom Boobinga wood and was absolutely gorgeous.

Kori is an O.K. instrument but would not be my first choice.