Handmade Musical Instruments to Gift

Buy for the player's hands and ears, not just the look. For a beginner or a kid, a solid-mahogany soprano ukulele ($45-$120) or a 17-key kalimba in C ($25-$70) plays in tune out of the box and needs no amp. Folk and blues players gravitate to a fretted cigar-box guitar (3- or 4-string, $90-$250) or a hand-tuned diatonic ocarina. For rhythm, a goatskin djembe or a tunable cajon runs $80-$300. Check the tonewood (mahogany, koa, spruce, walnut), the scale length, and the key the maker lists, since a kalimba in C and one in G feel very different to play. Ask whether a setup, strings, gig bag, or tuner is included. Most off-the-shelf builds ship in 3-7 business days; custom inlay, a specific tuning, or a from-scratch instrument runs 2-6 weeks, so order well ahead of birthdays and the holidays.

Jump to Synthesizers & Effects for electronic gear, or use the filters and related searches below to narrow by instrument type, skill level, tonewood, or key.