the ideal sound - so subjective... what do you listen for?

[blango]

I have to laugh sometimes about the differing schools of thought regarding the sound of a drum.

We all agree, a Palladium is about the worst sounding drum on the market, but some of us like the funky cracked, old, beatup and almost dead sound.

What do we look for?

For me, I want a punchy, clear, heavy on the mid range tone, even on a requinto, or a tumba.. and a second of sustain ending without a ring.

For Salsa and some Latin Jazz, i like a more bright sound, for small combo work and folkloric styles, i like a more muted sound.. full, but muted.

Tony



Edited By blango on 1204850542

Attachment: http://mycongaplace.com/forum/eng/uploa ... 5_0091.jpg

[Whopbamboom]

Blango, you have this in the timbale section... was that deliberate?

[windhorse]

I have to second exactly what you said..

But I wouldn't same the same about timbales

[Mike]

Windhorse, I´m not too sure if the sound of a good vintage TIMBALES set is not superior to a new one out of the box.

I say the CONGA sound we´re all after only comes time after time and it means a perfect balance of two components:
The player and his/her technique:
.......practicing.........learning..............experiencing.........listening

The instrument, notably skin, but also construction:
............breaking in....................maturing...............aged wood..............

(BTW except for listening, all criteria also apply to savouring good whiskey, i.e. a decent single malt :laugh: )

An example concerning sound I would like to share is the first conga drum I ever called my own. It looks close to the picture in Tony´s initial post, I don´t know the brand, it was rather cheap - yes, arrgh, with sewn-in wire instead of tucked skin - but nevertheless, in order to upgrade I spent about 80$ on a real Cuban cow skin which was very hard to get. That was 20 years ago, I was a very inexperienced player. I would love to have this skin again on my LP Classic quinto... But actually it was a Requinto size, so reskinning is not possible.
But you know what: It´s this old, cheap, battered conga I still love for its dry, mellow (nothing about dull here) and yet characteristic, most individual SOUND!
Hope this story was not too sentimental
Mike

P.S.: Final edit: Don´t know why this topic is in the timbales section. Perhaps is possible to move to the conga thread. Abakua, is it doable?



Edited By Mike on 1205296858

[Raymond]

Regarding the sound of vintage timbales, vintage timbales, regardless of the material they were made, were intended to sound warmer. Thicker metal shells made the trick for old timbales....The "new" trend is to make them project more in volume when played therefore, thinner shell timbales is the norm now with overtones in it.

One thing that is perhaps the key to get an old vintage timbale sound is the type of head, thicker better, and the tunning (low)..that way you get a good sloppy timbale sound like the old school...

Saludos!

[Mike]

Thicker metal shells made the trick for old timbales....The "new" trend is to make them project more in volume when played therefore, thinner shell timbales is the norm now with overtones in it.

Hi Raymond,
How are you doing? After some extensive playing I discovered that my vintage 1980s Afro Timbales we talked about a couple of weeks ago DOES have many overtones probably due to a NOT thick shell - but I dig the sound of the skins . But this model has got a cáscara sound that I stillgrapple with, it´s difficult to get a decent sound, I have also tried many different kinds of sticks. A maple Tito Puente model does the job best.
Perhaps you´re right and I should look for the "real" vintage sound, for example the massive Tito Puente Timbales of the 1970s/80s. Hard to find though, especially if you are a bit short of the buck...
Just wanted to chime in on this topic. Of course very little overtones also means a not so good projection, right? So for live situation (when not miked) I think the thinner shells do the trick quite well, don´t they?

My regards
Mike

[bongosnotbombs]

A friend of mine has a set of JCR timbales for sale in excellent condition.
I believe he is asking $350 American for them.

If anyone is interested I can let him know. He's also a board member, and
completely trustworthy.

[umannyt]

BNB,

Thanks for the heads up. I sent you a PM.

FYI,

[ABAKUA]

We all agree, a Palladium is about the worst sounding drum on the market,
W

Are we talking LP Palladium Giovanni series congas? If so,
I actually couldnt disagree more, could it be that perhaps the congas were not tuned correctly or played by someone with poor sound technique? I think this is more so the case.
Having reviewed these congas for a magazine when they first came out and having endorsed these drums for 1 year during a tour when they first arrived in this country, my only complaint of these drums was that they were way too heavy.

They dont seem to sound too bad at this live gig I did on TV here with a former band I played in for a while: http://youtube.com/watch?v=7Tp89pMkPqs
An here shot in a night club so audio/visual aint the best... http://youtube.com/watch?v=xFQRGxvJV5g

re moving the thread to right section, we are still trying to sort minor things out with the new site/software, I dont have the Admin feature enabled yet, and havent been able to enable JC, Laurent Lamy etc with Moderator feature either yet, still waiting on a few things from CongaMan, (site owner)...

[ABAKUA]

I have moved this topic to the CongaSet and accesories section.

[Tonio]

Yo Tony !!
It is subjective my friend To me its really about what the situation is. Even in Salsa, there are miriads of different "Salsa", no? Old skool new skool An Latin Jazz? I dunno, where to start??
Even Ray Baretto would have different settings in his own band. From a recording sense, he loves to have a higher pitched macho, but then he will change to a lower pitched one all in the same album.
I think its more about the song , and what rhythm involved.si?

Never owned any Palladiums, but I think they will do the trick in most situations on the "modern " side.

T

I have to laugh sometimes about the differing schools of thought regarding the sound of a drum.

We all agree, a Palladium is about the worst sounding drum on the market, but some of us like the funky cracked, old, beatup and almost dead sound.

What do we look for?

For me, I want a punchy, clear, heavy on the mid range tone, even on a requinto, or a tumba.. and a second of sustain ending without a ring.

For Salsa and some Latin Jazz, i like a more bright sound, for small combo work and folkloric styles, i like a more muted sound.. full, but muted.

Tony



Edited By blango on 1204850542

Attachment: http://mycongaplace.com/forum/eng/uploa ... 5_0091.jpg

[No.2-1820]

I've definitely entered a more experimental phase of my drumming and I'm enjoying what I'm finding. Struggling to find the sounds that I'm looking for when playing mostly latin based rhythms (straight tumbaos and samba variations) with midtempo (114 bpm) hip hop style beats for a music project with some friends, I switched my drums around, I now have the smithy tumba with a thick steer tuned higher and in front of me as the main drum and my valje conga, which has possibly it's original skin and is very deep and mellow, tuned low and sitting in for the tumba. The slaps, open tones and muffs on the tumba seem to have a lot more resonance than the quinto or the conga have. I seem to be using my quinto and requinto less and less, I think I'm starting to come round to the Candido etc way of thinking where they would often use variously tuned congas rather than quinto, conga, tumba set ups.

Barrie

[caballoballo]

Hey Mike, twinsbongo (Julito) has a set of those old Tito Puente Timbales for sale. Abakua, good sounding drums on Son Veneno.

Ideal sound ? For me on Bongos is the old school dry sound from the Hembra.

[ABAKUA]

Thanks!
Did you like the sound here in this clip? Man, its a shame this band is no longer around with the line up we had when I was in it, its now a 5 piece Trova/Son band.
The band was sounding tight for this gig on national live TV here:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=7Tp89pMkPqs