so I come here (salt lake city) from Puerto Rico/Sierra Leonne (parents divorced had to spend time in both places) to become a music major to study marimba and voice but apparantly no one knows what a marimba is nor where to get one so I've been out of practice for a year! they don't even have xylophones or vibes here what am I to do

go to a better school.

i can't imagine any 4-year university that wouldn't have at least a part-time percussion faculty member, who would of course know all you'd expect him/her to know about the instrument (hopefully). if you can't afford to go to a different school, maybe you could call up a larger university's music department and ask about taking lessons from a grad student. that's what i did in highschool.

you could also attempt to learn as much as you can on your own. buy leigh howard stephen's "method of movement" (that's probably the most common marimba book) and read the text, and start on exercise #1, but remember not to cheat yourself. that's where the convenience of a teacher comes in handy...it's easy to let yourself get away with more than you probably should...but a good instructor won't let you.

good luck!

wonko

have you brought it to the attention of the administration. some schools that don't have faculty will pay a private teacher that you can travel (not too far) to study with. I think Catholic University does that so, some time ago, many of the military band percussionists used to attend Catholic but go up to Philly to study with someone like Alan Abel (as an example). Greg

where are you going to school? the U of U? cause I know they haave quite a percussion ensemble, or so I hear.