Drumbone

Several of our students have elected to enter The Blue Man group instrument competition as their problem solving goal. The Blue Man group is widely regarded as highly entertaining because of their poignant observations and because of their crass humor. Both of these characteristics make the group particularly popular among middle level students and we have taken our students to see live performances on the Boston trip twice.

Of the many innovative instruments, the drumbone is one of the most compelling because it is large and it requires multiple people to play. The drumbone combines the sliding action of a trombone with the percussive action of a drum.

Our students are modifying a prototype that I built as an example. They are also reading several different research papers on drumbone design. These papers each highlight significant mathematical relationships between the dimensions of the drumbone and frequencies produced by the instruments.

If the students win the competition, they could earn up to $5000.