Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Forum fully dedicated to the instrument

Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby Beatnik07 » Sat Jan 09, 2021 2:20 pm

I was wondering if there was such thing.
Ideally a salsa tune, with a beat "1" voice over....

My search so far has given out only a few things, and unfortunately often with already a bongo playing. Which I prefer not, to avoid getting confused.

By the way, Happy New Year for everybody !!!
User avatar
Beatnik07
 
Posts: 166
Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2019 9:07 am
Location: Paris, France

Re: Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby Chtimulato » Sat Jan 09, 2021 4:18 pm

This band has no bongó player :

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DbBXv3-edrE&index=11&list=RDt47fFexzgQI[/youtube]

They recorded several albums.

You can also use several apps on a phone or a tablet, enabling or disabling the bongó track

https://play.google.com/store/search?q=salsa%20rhythm&c=apps&hl=fr&gl=US
(You can also enable or disable the "one".)

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.funkydrumtutor.PercussiontutorUnity&hl=fr&gl=US

They also exist for iOS.
User avatar
Chtimulato
 
Posts: 529
Joined: Thu Oct 15, 2015 8:54 pm
Location: Heights of France

Re: Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby jorge » Sat Jan 09, 2021 6:15 pm

Beatnik07, that is a great question. The son by Vieja Trova Santiaguera is an excellent suggestion by Chtimulato, nice transition of the clave from danzon to a combined son/rumba clave. One time, taking the double entendre too literally, that song made me start dancing again too soon after a sprained ankle and delayed my recovery!
Apps like Percussion Tutor are good for working out new riffs, they do give you the mechanical timing and force you to come up with your own floreos rather than copying what the bongo player just did on the track. But they lack any kind of swing, feeling or sabor to inspire you to talk back to other instruments or singers. I am partial to human musicians interacting with each other, both for playing and for learning.
Once you have basic techniques down, it is important to get away from the "salsa tune with beat 1 voiceover" and learn to hold time on your own and play with clave (meaning the concept and feeling not the instrument). This is best done playing live with others who have excellent timing and play in clave. These days that is not happening. Next best is playing with a recording of great music that does not have your instrument, so you learn to use other timing cues to stay on time. I am not talking about some salsa band that plays to a click track and doesn't feel the clave, I am talking about master musicians that play in clave with great feeling that gets inside you so you can't go off time. I like playing with piano and maybe vocals but no percussion. Playing on top of another bongo player you tend to listen to their floreos and then play them in a different time of the song where they don't fit as well. If there is no other bongo player you have to respond to the other instruments, it is more realistic.
One great example I have been playing along with recently is the new album by Lazara Cachao and Olvido Ruiz Castellanos. If you don't know them, you should, pianist and singer respectively. Lazara Cachao Lopez is great niece of Israel Cachao Lopez, daughter of Cachaito, and plays piano with rock solid timing and great feeling and her montunos really swing. Olvido Ruiz Castellanos is a fantastic singer, daughter of Jacqueline Castellanos, one of the greatest soneras ever to come out of Cuba. They all were born in Cuba but currently live in Germany. If you notice that Lazara's piano style is heavily influenced by Danzon, it is, maybe because her great uncle Cachao wrote literally thousands of Danzones, more than any other single person has ever written. Here are 3 by this great duo.

Manisero
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vp3Uw5i ... O8oOrmzZtL

Frutas de Caney
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcdrOMM ... tL&index=9

Añoranza, Lazara and Olvido with Jacqueline Castellanos. Check out the mother daughter interaction. That is how music is taught and learned, mainly in families.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lXxFF1 ... tL&index=3


Another example is the album Chucho Valdes did with his father Bebo. Just 2 pianos. Bebo is on the right channel, Chucho on the left channel if you hadn't figured that out already. Tremenda clave, if you get lost playing along with them you need to spend more time playing clave and cascara along with these songs and lots of others before going back to bongo. Actually that is a good thing to do anyway.

Descarga Valdes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACluWAl3Jp0

Son de la loma
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUK-qMOUetU
jorge
 
Posts: 1128
Joined: Thu Jun 15, 2006 3:47 am
Location: Teaneck, NJ

Re: Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby Beatnik07 » Sat Jan 09, 2021 7:04 pm

Thanks Chtimulato and Jorge for these wonderful suggests !!!

So far I have been practicing with the Salsa Rhythm app. It's great but the repertoire especially for piano and bass is a bit limited (or feel that way after many weeks of practicing with the app).

Also, and Jorge is making a very good point: I should wean myself of the "1" voiceover .... (scary concept ... :) )

After I wrote my post here, this afternoon I went back to looking on the web, and found these, but they are not "real" songs, some even are not salsa per se (although that's not necessarily a problem), and some are plain "backing tracks":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTroZnjyPmk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJg5tfBNzVA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dH1oIidGvLw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7tLcUxDLcI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEjjYyrt4Rk

Again, thanks for your great suggests !!
User avatar
Beatnik07
 
Posts: 166
Joined: Sat Nov 16, 2019 9:07 am
Location: Paris, France

Re: Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby Chtimulato » Sat Jan 09, 2021 8:54 pm

Great suggestions from Jorge too.
I should have mentionned that all songs from la Vieja Trova Santiaguera are played without bongó, at least on the 2 albums I own.

Jorge :
that song made me start dancing again too soon after a sprained ankle and delayed my recovery!


Sorry to read that. Hope I shall not end up in jail because of that. :) More seriously, be prudent.
User avatar
Chtimulato
 
Posts: 529
Joined: Thu Oct 15, 2015 8:54 pm
Location: Heights of France

Re: Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby Thomas Altmann » Sun Jan 10, 2021 11:27 am

I have this record and played bongos along:

https://youtu.be/neag4wNLLlU

It's "minus bongó". However, I had problems identifying the clave direction of some tracks.

Happy New Year!

Thomas
Thomas Altmann
 
Posts: 897
Joined: Sun Jul 02, 2006 12:25 pm
Location: Hamburg

Re: Good bongos practicing tracks on YouTube ?

Postby jorge » Sun Jan 10, 2021 4:56 pm

Chtimulato wrote:
that song made me start dancing again too soon after a sprained ankle and delayed my recovery!

Sorry to read that. Hope I shall not end up in jail because of that. :) More seriously, be prudent.

No worries, that was probably 30 years ago and you are protected by a statute of limitations. Seriously, though, my point is that the song was never about bodily injuries, canes or physical crutches, or even about dancing, those are metaphors. The double entendre is one of the most fascinating aspects of AfroCuban music.
jorge
 
Posts: 1128
Joined: Thu Jun 15, 2006 3:47 am
Location: Teaneck, NJ


Return to Bongo

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 8 guests