A friction mallet, commonly known as a "flumie," is designed to extract long, sustained tones and rich overtones from a gong. Featuring a thin plastic or wooden handle and a silicon rubber head, the flumie works by gently dragging the head along the gong’s surface. This motion creates subtle vibrations that "tease" sound from the gong, much like the technique used to make a Tibetan singing bowl resonate.
Flumies come in a variety of shapes and sizes, with each one imparting its own distinct vibration to the gong. When used together or individually, they offer dynamic possibilities for intuitive, meditative play.
How to play To begin, hold the flumie near its silicon head, gently gripping it between your thumb and the inside of your index finger. Avoid squeezing the handle—allowing the flumie to move freely is essential for generating vibrations.
With a relaxed grip, softly drag the head across the gong’s surface without applying pressure. As you continue, you’ll feel the vibrations begin to build. It’s normal if the sound doesn’t arise immediately; patience is part of the process. Once the sound emerges, let the gong "play out," allowing the tone to blossom fully before continuing.
As you become more comfortable, experiment with your grip. Holding the flumie further from the head can make initiating vibrations more challenging but produces a slightly lower tone. Similarly, using flumies of different sizes allows for a range of pitch variations, with larger heads producing lower tones and smaller heads creating higher ones.
In this way, each flumie greatly increases the variety of possible sounds you can create. We highly recommend acquiring several to experiment with.