The temple blocks are tuned percussion instruments. The types of temple blocks that are used in the western classical orchestra are similar to instruments used to accompany Buddhist chant in China, Japan and Korea.
The composer David Horne used temple blocks in his SoundJunction piece Emerging Dances:
Temple blocks are made of camphor wood. They are spherical slit drums - hollow spheres carved out of wood with a large slit in the side. The pitch of the note that they produce depends on their size, the bigger they are the lower the note.
David Hockings demonstrates how to play the temple blocks...
