A newbie with a couple of questions

[Tristian]

Hello! I am new here, and so am going to first introduce myself to all you congueros out there. I have been playing the congas for one year, and the piano for 14 years. I am self taught on both instruments. Where I live, I have almost no access to a conga teacher. And, being totally blind, I had the challenge of finding a good Youtube video that clearly explained the basic rhythm of the tumbao, until I found an excerpt from Poncho Sanchez's Introduction To Latin Music dvd. So, I took that information to the middle school's set of Toca Player's series congas with some older version of Remo heads which were not too forgiving to the hands, even for a more experienced player. So, during the second semester of my freshman year, I took Music Study with the band teacher, which is a class where you can do absolutely any musical thing you want, like learn an instrument. So, I took that oppertunity and developed my sound. I am working at getting that signature sound you hear in Mongo's recordings. So, now onto my questions. So I've tried out several sets of congas, such as the Cp fiberglass ones, which I cringe when I hear a slap which sounds so powerful, and just what I'm looking for, until you hear the added overtone that sounds like the ringing you hear as a basketball bounces up from the ground. I have tried the Player's series, and I have quickly learned that I don't like fiberglass congas, because of the weird overtones. And, I can't aford a handmade drum that costs $800 each. So, I am going with the Thai stuff. I have played the Meinl Marathons, Lp Performers, and the aspires. I would like to hear your opinions on which conga you personally would recommend. Oh, also I have read around here, and some of you are happy with Matadors. Another drum I have looked at online is the Rhythm Traders Master series congas, which from what information I've gathered looks to me like a promising alternative to the Lp Gio Galaxies. Have any of you played these? What are your thoughts on the clearity of tones like open, bass, and slap? Thank you very much, and I am looking forward to hear what you guys have to say. Oh one more question. Since I can't see, I'd just like to know what finishes look cool on congas, such as one that might show wood grain like a natural finish, or what colors you like on congas.

[burke]

Hi Tristan,

Welcome to the forum! It would be tough to find good descriptive videos I would think. As you mentioned a lot of folks like matadors and if you put a decent skin on them, they get even better. Can't comment on the other brand - but I personally prefer a dark stained wood grain over painted when it comes to looks.

Cheers

Darrell

[CongaTick]

Hey Tristan.

Welcome. Had Ardientes which are Sam Ash generics made of "Siam oak" (whatever that is) and switched to Matadors. Absolutely love 'em. They're kickass, utilitarian tubs that will deliver a superb sound depending on your technique and the skin mounted. I use Remo Syndeeps but also retain a set of Water Buffalos for accoustic settings. All around--best value for those who are not into boutique drums--Matadors, IMHO.

[pcastag]

matadors would get my vote for best mid range priced drum. used you can get them really cheap sometimes.

[Thebreeze]

I have to echo pcastag and CongaTick on the Matadors. You can't go wrong for the value and they are good enough for Pro playing anytime. Here is a Youtube link of Orquesta de la luz where the Conga player is Highlighted playing his Matadors. Worth looking at.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOa6xgN-XhM

another Orquesta de la Luz again, Matadors highlighted. Not to mention the killer timbalero as well. Great Salsa band from Japan.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mIM45Uc ... re=related

[Derbeno]

Someone will have to look at it for him

[Thebreeze]

I'm sorry about that. I overlooked that when I read the post. But the sound will come through nicely and you can hear the Matadors on the clips. Again, I apologize about that. I have heard that if you have lost your sight that your other senses will be hightened. I hope this is true as I would hope that you will be able to pick up sounds more acutely than normal.
I for one have problems with distinquishing those fine lines between Tone, Bass, Pop, Slap, etc.. and in execution of them. I have had people that are better congeros tell me I need to work on accurately making those different hits and it's not easy for me. Maybe this will be an area that you will be able to do well in. Thanks.

[rhythmrhyme]

Hey Tristan,

Congratulations on taking up another instrument! I played keys as a child, but was always going on and on about the drums, so finally my parents got me a kit when I was 10. It took a few years before they would let me stop taking piano lessons, but they eventually caved in In retrospect, there are times when I wish I had kept up with the keys, but there are only so many hours in the day and man, I practiced sooo many hours on the kit as a kid...

Regarding the congas, I give beginner/intermediate level lesson and spend lots of time trying to convince new students to actually LISTEN to the sounds they are making. The distinction between tones, slaps, bass, muff, grace notes etc is so important. Although the placement of the hand and visual aspect of this are a useful start point, the hand placement and movement is really all about producing the correct sound. I've spent hundreds of hours practicing those techniques and I'm sure that someone watching would have a very hard time seeing the subtle differences in the movements my hands make. The minute adjustments necessary to distinguish between a tone and a "non" note are, in my opinion, all about listening to the sound and making very fine adjustments to how your hand hits the drum. Personally, I often close my eyes when I'm doing this and when practicing rudiments I find myself to often be meditating on various things that have nothing to do with the drums.

One thing I can describe for you is this, conga drumming involves minimal "force" and is more about letting your hands fall with the weight of gravity. Once they hit the drum they don't immediately bounce off like they would on a djembe. Rather, they rest gently on the edge of the drum, thereby subtly controlling the resonance of the head.

I'll continue to think about your learning objectives and if I come across something I'll definitely post it here.

[s'chopp]

Welcome to the forum Tristan, how's the practice going?

[Tristian]

Hey guys! I haven't been on in a little while, because right at that time I posted, I left my dad's and flew back home right after that. Then started school. Thank you for all of your replies. I'll check those two videos out. And don't feel sorry at all. I am looking for the sound in the video. It is always good for me to have a description of what actually is happening in the video, but I am okay without when it is just me in the room browsing conga videos on Youtube. I haven't been able to practice the congas yet because it is towards the beginning of the school year, and Mr. Riler hasn't dug them out of the percussion room yet. Once again thank you all. Here is a link to a performance last year I recorded with my Zoom H1 recorder. In the Music Study class, my friend Reggie and I came up with our version of Morning, based off of Tito Puente's recording. It was recorded in the gym during the high school's talent show. There aren't very many people in the high school who take interest in Latin music, so all you here is the two of us. No bass player or other parts of the rhythm section. I play piano, while Reggie plays a guiro that I had. And then I quickly switch over to the congas, and Reggie puts down the guiro, and picks up the cha cha bell. Then we go into some improvised rumba, and Reggie uses a clave block that I got for Christmas. It is in the shape of a pig. haha I bet that looked interesting in the performance. I unexpectedly got the audience to join in clapping. This recording will give you somewhat of an idea of how far I've gotten in playing the tumbadoras.
https://dl.dropbox.com/u/8449597/Tristi ... ditted.mp3
Once again, they are Cp congas. They were hugging the right side of the piano, so I could switch from piano to congas with minimal effort.

[jorge]

Hi Tristian,
Welcome to the forum. You ask some very good questions and I think we can give you some good answers. First, your performance on both piano and congas was excellent. You have good timing, you stayed in clave, and you get good sound out of the CP congas that you were playing. You seem to have listened well to your records, teachers and role models, and some of Mongo's sound is recognizable in your playing. It is hard to believe you have only been playing congas for a year! To help us give you better advice about choosing congas, here are some questions for you.

1) What kind of music will you mainly be playing, and in what settings? Amplified band or acoustic groups including rumba, bembe, folkloric styles? R&B, jazz, timba or salsa? Mostly live or mostly recordings? Playing along with reggaeton, hip hop or other amplified electronic music?
2) Where are you located? Is there any chance of finding a good teacher who can not only play congas but also teach and teach you as a blind student? I have a friend who is blind and plays congas and I had to make some adjustments in my teaching style to be able to teach him well. A good teacher can be a major help.
3) Is there a music store nearby that will let you try out the congas? Ideally, you will be able to find a conga with a good skin that suits your needs already on it. Matadors with real cuero skins, a little on the thick side, sound great and last many years, but you really should play them (at least the conga) to see if that setup is too hard on your hands. The conga and the slaps are what matter for hard skins, the tumba and playing tones usually don't hurt your hands like slaps on the conga. A slightly smaller conga (11" rather than 11.5" or 11.75") can be a little softer on your hands for the same tuned pitch, but may not project quite as far.

A few comments:
1) If you are planning to play with amplified instruments or electronic backing tracks, I would highly recommend getting a good mic like a Shure SM57. This will help you save your hands.
2) If you are going to play with anything louder than an acoustic Cuban son type group, you should strongly consider using hearing protectors. I did damage to my hearing while I was playing with salsa and rock fusion bands in college and it has just gotten slowly worse in the 38 years since then. Drum set, cymbals, claves, electric guitars, DJs, cowbells, and trying to be heard over amplified instruments are all hazards to your hearing.
3) Your slaps sound good. I don't know what kind of skins those CP congas have but most tend to have relatively thin water buffalo or steer that is not optimal for sound. With a thicker, stiffer skin they can sound better, with easier and crisper slaps and purer tones with less overtones. The difficult part is that thicker skins can also be harder on your hands. So choice of skins becomes particularly important. I have played real cowhide skins, as well as bull and mule, that gave good sound without being too hard on the hands, but finding a skin with just the right balance can take a little trial and error. The skin I have on my conga now sounds great but is really hard and I know if I was gigging regularly with a band my hands would be in chronic pain. With some practice, you can get very good slaps without hurting your hands from even some thinner skins, but you will need to choose the skins carefully. Some people like plastic skins and say they are easier on your hands. I don't personally like the plastic skins I have tried but some professional conga players like Pedrito Martinez can get great sound out of plastic skins.

[Tristian]

Thank you for your tips. There are two situations I'd use my congas for. The first one is something similar to Poncho Sanchez's Latin jazz band, but maybe bigger. I also have failed to mention that I have lately gotten into charanga music from the 50's. I fell for Orquesta Aragon's music after only listening to one song for the first time from them. They are my all-time favorite band who I am going to see at the end of this month at Seattle's Jazz Alley. So I plan to use them in those two types of situations. I yesterday found a video of somebody playing on a set of three Meinl Woodcraft congas. I thought that he sounded fantastic, and sounded something like what I'm looking for. Warm, fairly resonant but not like fiberglass drums, also with little overtone, and loud and bright slaps that sound almost like firecrackers. So would you recommend a skin that would give me a similar sound to that? Any possible brands? I know that lots of you mount them yourselves, but, judging by what I've read on how to do it, I can see some disasterous possibilities if I tried. I don't know anybody in the area knoledgeable enough to teach me. So are there companies out there that sell premounted skins for Lp sizes?

[jorge]

A latin jazz style band is very different from a charanga band, as I am sure you know. You probably would play a single conga without a mic in the charanga group and a conga and tumba with one or two mics in the latin jazz group. You could use the same conga for both, for the charanga group you want it to have a nice full tone and you want to be able to get a clear dry slap from it without hitting too hard. For the latin jazz group you want the tumba to be a little bigger and louder than the conga, lower notes don't carry quite as well. I personally like to play sitting down and the tipped conga also gives more projection than the tumba sitting flat on the floor. If you stand there may be less of a difference.
The easiest would be if you can find a drum that already has a skin on it that you can get good sound from. Do you live somewhere that you can go and try out different drums with different skins? If at all possible, I think you should try to play a few different drums before you buy. I personally prefer wood to fiberglass but I have been surprised more than once by a fiberglass drum that sounds really good, it is not impossible. When you go to hear other groups play, if you like the way the congas sound go up to the conga player after the set and tell him/her. In the course of the conversation ask what kind of drums they are, what kind of skin, can you play it after the show? Are there other drummers in your area whose drums you can try to see what you like and don't like?

[Tristian]

I don't live near a place that I can just walk or be driven to in a matter of 5 to 10 minutes. I went to Portland for my birthday last May, and played a set of Meinl Marathons at Rhythm Traders. They were the best set of drums I played there. I didn't take much interest in touching aspires, or any of the lower end models, as I feel that a player who is not professional like me should start off with a quality drum. The only thing that bugged me about the Marathons, and this has proven itself also at a Guitar Center I had visited that previous summer that the Marathons had this annoying overtone that unlike the drums at the high school sustained itself after a slap was played. I liked the sound of my slaps at Rhythm Traders. They were much more full and had more projection. I haven't played Matadors yet, because nobody has them around here. I have just heard videos on Youtube, btw those two links posted earlier were wonderful. Thank you. I think that the conguero in Orquesta Aragon uses Tycoon drums, because the last time I was on Tycoon's site, I was browsing the artists section to find out all of the congueros that used Tycoon so I could look them up on Youtube. Tycoon lists an artist's name, tells what model of instrument from them he plays, and then tells which band he's in. I found Orquesta Aragon listed under one of the guys' names, but I can't remember who it was. I am for sure that Tycoon is out of my price range for any of their full sized models. I also last summer played a set of Lp performers, and thought that they weren't too bad. Of course they were hugging a wall, and almost right above my hand were cowbells hanging, so the conditions of where I played them weren't too ideal. And, the quinto was on a stand meant for seated players, and about a foot higher the conga and tumba were on a double stand. So a summary of the drums I've played. First I began on the Toca Players congas with heads that felt like cardboard on a hard floor. Next I had a chance to play some Marathons, at the time my slap wasn't as good, but I still liked the drums way better than the Tocas. At the high school I have played the Cp congas, and was forced to learn to like the overtones from both drums, even when playing open tones. And finally I have played two sets of Marathons after my quest to further improve my sound in Music Study. Out of all those drums, I liked the Marathons best, and am interested to see what the Matadors have to offer me.

[torpedo tom]

Nice playing.