Anything else that members might want to use to make their instruments
Instructions
Give members a certain amount of time; less time is probably needed for younger members as they will make simpler instruments. A time between 1- 2 hours should be good.
You can let them members have creativity with their instruments some ideas are:
Drums of different sizes for different pitches
Flutes with holes drilled in pipe
Xylophone with pipes of different lengths
Guitars/ukuleles with rubber bands for strings
Science Behind It
One main concept in making an instrument is understanding how sound works. All sound moves in waves and waves are made from things vibrating. For example when you pluck a string on a guitar, the string will vibrate, causing the air around it to vibrate to, which creates the sounds you hear. The pitch of the sound is determined by the frequency. The frequency is basically how often a spot on the wave passes a given point. The more times it passes the point, the higher the frequency and the higher the pitch. The slower the frequency the lower the pitch. In order to get a louder sound you need to have a larger amplitude on your wave. The larger the amplitude the louder the sound, the smaller the amplitude the quieter the sound.
Instruments work in a similar manner, the larger the instrument, like a tuba, the lower the sounds are and the smaller the instrument, like a piccolo, the higher the pitches are. That’s because in a larger instrument more effort is going in to pushing the vibrated air, whether it be the thicker strings of an upright bass or the larger amount of piping in a tuba, and it takes less effort to push the vibrations through a smaller amount of tubing, like in a flute, or vibrate thinner strings, like on a violin. On reed instruments the vibrations comes from the wooden or plastic reed, while on brass instruments, the vibrations comes from the player’s lips.
Tips
For younger members it is suggested to have some ideas for simple instruments. Also to end your meeting you can have groups of members make up a song to perform for the rest of the group on their instruments.