Colors is a series of short marimba etudes, all of which were written within the range of a 4 1/3 octave instrument. The purpose of these compositions is to assist intermediate marimba students in exploring the wide palette of tone colors that one can produce on the marimba, which I find to be the most attractive attribute of the instrument’s sound.
Before examining the mechanics of how to produce different tone colors, I think it is crucial to always keep in mind a three-step approach towards tone production, which I have lived by for many years, including:

1) Thinking, imagining and knowing the sound I want to produce.
2) Producing it.
3) Listening and checking if the sound I am producing matches with what I imagined.

Conceptually, these steps seem very simple, but in the frenzy of playing, coupled with performance anxiety, one can easily forget steps one and three. Especially since marimba playing is such a physical act, I can speak from personal experiences that one can easily fall into the trap of playing without thinking or listening.

In analyzing the mechanics of tone production on the marimba, I have divided the physical stroke of marimba playing into three categories. For every note, one is to use a combination of these three stroke aspects to produce sound.

1) Stroke Shades
2) Stroke Weight
3) Stroke Speed

This is not a conclusive system of all the tone colors one can produce on the marimba.
It is simply an introductory window, which I have found helpful for tone color explorations.