How to Play Wine Glasses

Playing wine glasses produces an eerie and unusual sound that will bring a smile to the face of the most stern listener. While it's difficult to create dynamic rhythms on wine glasses, you can definitely make some strange and even beautiful melodies. Follow these steps to learn how.

Difficulty:

Moderate

Instructions

1. Get the right set of glasses. You should find a set of wine glasses that have fairly thin rims. Thicker rims will make creating the sing-song sound on the glasses more difficult. Also, consider using a variety of glass types so you can get some different notes out of the "instruments."

2. Fill the glasses with different amounts of water. Even though you may have discovered that wine glasses make music while drinking wine from the glass, water is a good substitute, and it won't stain your carpet or shirt when you knock over a glass. Fill the glasses with different amounts of water and then play each one to gauge the sound.

3. Tune the glasses. If you're looking to be a little more precise about your wine glass music, you can use a digital tuner to adjust the amounts of water in the glass to get the right note.

4. Wet your finger with some water and rub it along the rim of the glass. If you don't hear anything at first, don't give up. It sometimes takes three or four seconds for enough vibration to build in the glass before the glass starts to ring.

5. Alternate between glasses to produce a melody. Eventually, you will learn the exact touch required to produce sound from the glass so you can quickly switch between glasses to keep your melody moving forward.