Real recorded harmonium notes on a piano keyboard: click, touch or type, and the harmonium answers. The harmonium is an organ without pipes: the reeds give it a warm, slightly nasal tone. Free, nothing to install, with note names, your computer keyboard and a metronome.
Recorded notes, the harmonium's own range, and the keyboard you already know.
Every key plays a recording of a real harmonium: 38 notes from C2 to D5, each key pitched from the nearest one. The harmonium is free-reed keyboard instrument: air from bellows makes metal reeds vibrate, one reed per note; the player pumps the bellows with the feet or, on the Indian harmonium, with one hand.
The keyboard covers C2 to F5, where the recordings sound natural; a real harmonium plays C2 to D5 on this page. Use the octave arrows to move, and More keys on a wide screen.
Play a drone - hold one low note with the left hand - and a slow melody above it, as in Indian music. The note sounds as long as you hold the key, like a bow or a breath.
Famous harmonium music: Indian bhajans, qawwali and Hindustani music; Dvořák, Bagatelles, Op. 47 (with string trio); Hymns in small churches and chapels. Pick out a melody by ear on the keyboard above.
Click or touch a key. The first note starts the sound; the harmonium recordings for the visible keys load in the background.
A S D F G H J K L play the white keys, W E T Y U O P the black ones (Q and Z on AZERTY). Z and X move an octave (W and X on AZERTY).
Set Labels to C D E or Do Ré Mi to see every note name, or to Keys to see your own keyboard letters.
Turn on the metronome and play along. Then try the same melody on the organ or the piano.
| Type | Sampled harmonium, playable on this page, free |
|---|---|
| Family | Keyboards - free-reed keyboard instrument |
| Samples | 38 recorded notes, C2 to D5 |
| Range here | C2 to F5 |
| Real range | C2 to D5 on this page |
| Notation | Treble and bass clef |
| Controls | Labels, octave arrows, More keys and a metronome |
| Computer keyboard | Ableton layout by key position - QWERTY, AZERTY, QWERTZ |
| Credits | Harmonium samples from tonejs-instruments by Nicholas Brosowsky, CC BY 3.0 - see credits |
| Requirements | Any modern browser with Web Audio - Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari |
Most online instruments are a synthesiser with a picture on top. This one plays recordings of a real harmonium, so the attack, the tone and the decay are the instrument's own. The harmonium is an organ without pipes: the reeds give it a warm, slightly nasal tone.
Alexandre Debain patented the harmonium in Paris in 1840 as an affordable organ for homes, chapels and schools. Brought to India in the 19th century, the hand-pumped harmonium became central to Indian devotional and classical music.
A real harmonium is written in treble and bass clef. The keyboard here plays the sounding notes, so a melody you find by ear is the melody you hear. To go further, the free sheet music and chord pages work with any instrument you can read music on.
Yes. Every key plays a recording of a real harmonium - 38 notes from C2 to D5 - pitched to the nearest key. The recordings come from the tonejs-instruments library, under a Creative Commons licence.
Yes. The middle row of letters plays the white keys and the row above it the black keys, by key position, so it works the same on QWERTY, AZERTY and QWERTZ keyboards. Set Labels to Keys to see the letters on the keys.
A harmonium plays C2 to D5 on this page. On this page the keyboard goes from C2 to F5, where the recordings sound natural.
Indian bhajans, qawwali and Hindustani music; Dvořák, Bagatelles, Op. 47 (with string trio); Hymns in small churches and chapels.
Yes, free with no account and nothing to install. It runs in any modern browser, on a computer, a tablet or a phone.
The harmonium on this page is free, with no account. GOONS Studio adds a sampled piano, drum machines, synths and a sequencer in the browser - free for 7 days, no card required.
Free on this page, no account. Play the organ →