Simple flutes sound beautiful and are easy to make from bamboo, wood, clay, metal, plastic, or almost any material that can form a tube. Mark Shepard, author of Simple Flutes: A Guide to Flute Making and Playing suggests a good “first” flute is one with six holes that can play a major scale in tune for two full octaves. For more information on how to make and play your own flute, visit Mark Shepard’s Flute Page.

Here’s a video on how to make your own PVC flute and the PDF to download so you can follow along!

This article is from our March-April 2011 issue. Click to order!

Other Instruments You Can Build Yourself

• Build Your Own Cajon
• Build Your Own Xylophone / Bongos