A basic rainstick is easily made by cutting the end off of a snake gourd, cleaning out the guts as much as possible, inserting some chicken wire and beads, gluing the end back on, and bang—you’re done.

Another technique is to run nails or wooden skewers through the sides to provide barriers for beads to collide with to make sound. If you do that, drill holes for the nails or skewers first and then glue them in. 

We’ve kicked this one up a notch to take into account the relatively thin shell of a snake gourd and also to employ… ping–pong balls! That, and drilling a bunch of little holes didn’t sound like all that much fun.

This instrument produces such a loud sound that “rainstick” didn’t adequately capture its character. Thus, the Downpour Stick was born.