Traditional M?ori musical instruments, collectively known as taonga puoro, resist the idea that instruments should be identical machines producing standardised notes. Te Ara describes how individual instruments may be given personal names and deliberately made slightly differently so each develops its own voice.
Even tuning can begin somewhere unexpected. Finger holes on some instruments were traditionally spaced according to the owner’s knuckles or patterns of stars. Early M?ori music also worked with microtonal intervals rather than the fixed semitone system familiar from Western equal temperament.
The p?t?rino fascinates me particularly. It can produce several distinct voices depending on how it is blown, while other instruments imitate birds, create low booming resonances, spin through the air or carry signals across long distances.
We often describe synthesizers by celebrating how many sounds one identical device can produce. Taonga puoro suggest almost the opposite idea: perhaps an instrument becomes interesting because it cannot be completely separated from the person who made and plays it.
https://teara.govt.nz/en/maori-musical-instruments-taonga-puoro