Songs on the xylophone

What this instrument has got

10 notes, C5 to E6 - a reach of 16 semitones, built from 7 pitch letters: C D E F G A B. Everything below follows from that row.

Why 37, and not 100

Ten bars, C5 up to E6 - an octave and a third. It is the smallest reach on the site, and twenty-three songs in the catalogue are simply wider than that; no key change can fold a two-octave tune into sixteen semitones.

The rest are refused the way the kalimba refuses: the bars are a major scale, so anything with an accidental has nowhere to land.

The bars ring an octave above where they are written, which is why almost every song here is lifted a full octave before it is taught. That is not a transposition anyone chose - a xylophone is a transposing instrument and always has been.

Counted: 23 songs are wider than the instrument, and 40 fit the span and are still refused, because somewhere in them is a note this instrument has not got.

Where the tunes sit

Of the 37 it plays, 0 are taught at written pitch , 23 move a whole octave - same note names, different register , and 14 change key altogether, which is what a player does when they pick up an instrument tuned to something other than C .

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The same catalogue, other instruments

One song list, nine instruments, and every one of them meets it differently.