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A mallet percussion instrument is a melodic percussion instrument played in a particular fashion, with mallets. Mallet percussion includes:
xylophone
glockenspiel (or bells)
vibraphone
marimba
Metallophone
crotales
balafon
aluphoneThe use of mallet percussion dates back at least 4,000 years to the first known xylophone. Mallet percussion was first used in a modern European orchestra in 1874, when Camille Saint-Saëns used a xylophone in his Dance Macabre.Modern mallet percussion instruments exist at many levels, from toy glockenspiels such as the Pixiphone popularly (and incorrectly) known as...