This will be a very brief history of the kazoo, even though it begins in seventeenth-century France with a little instrument called the eunuch flute*. It was held like a transverse flute, with the player singing into a hole on the side. The sound passed through a membrane of some kind, such as thin parchment or onion skin, and the end result was a somewhat nasal, buzzy sound.

And voilà! The kazoo was born! Well, not exactly. But the eunuch flute, the kazoo, and the mirliton (remember The Nutcracker?) are basically the same kind of instrument.

The kazoo itself is an American invention, though with a murky history. An African-American bearing the awesome name of Alabama Vest is often credited with inventing the instrument in 1840. There's no hard evidence for this, but the kazoo did have a large role in early African-American music, especially in country bands and jazz ensembles.

The kazoo became official when Warren Herbert Frost applied for the patent in 1883. A simpler version more in line with the instrument we're familiar with today was patented in 1902 by George D. Smith. Soon afterwards, factories were mass producing metal kazoos, the instrument that anyone can play! For more on the history of the kazoo, complete with sound samples, check out this fun article.

The kazoo is hot in Austin right now: not only did La Follia Austin Baroque utilize a kazoo to great effect in a recent performance of Leopold Mozart's Sleigh Ride, fans of KMFA will have the chance to make kazoo history playing the William Tell Overture during KMFA's 50^th birthday block party on January 29^th! I'm already practicing.

*No flutes were harmed during the writing of this article.