Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

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Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Beatnik07 » Mon Jan 18, 2021 10:31 am

Listening to some players, some bongos sound really good to me, ie especially the macho sounds very snappy and dry, almost a bit explosive, with a sort of "pop" sound.

With some other bongos and players (like mine, and like me) the macho sounds in comparison more "muffled", less sharp, with less distinct dynamics. I have tried to strike the macho with a more "slap-like" motion, but didn't get the sound I wanted (although I did get sore finger tips). I have tried to increase the tension on my macho natural factory head (LP), but I don't seem to get quite there (maybe I could, but the diverse cracking sounds from the drum stop me from going too far, or enough...).

    . Is it the way the player is striking ?
    . the type of drumhead (say, Remo, vs natural skin) ?
    . a correct macho tuning (or a very high head tension) ?
    . any other reason ?

These below illustrate more or less the macho sound I am aiming at:



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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

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

Hello.

These guys are profesionnal players, and have been practicing for years and decades. So it's logical that they have the "right" sound.

And it also depends on how long you practice. If you warm up everyday before playing, and the longer you play / practice, and the better the sound.

And now, go back to work ! :lol:
Last edited by Chtimulato on Tue Jan 19, 2021 10:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby jorge » Mon Jan 18, 2021 9:30 pm

Edgardo Cambon gives a little more detail on how to get the bongo accent sound and the other sounds in the martillo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCY3q2mE-kY
He describes and demonstrates how to get the accent sound starting at 16:30.
Once you have the sound in mind, you need to practice it like Chtimulato said. Focus on clean sharp sound with precise timing using one finger at first, don't worry about amplified salsa level volume.
To tune the macho, first make sure your bongo can withstand the forces of a high tuning. Most of the decent quality commercial bongos can, as long as it doesn't have weak hardware combined with a thick skin on the macho. If yours won't, either get better quality bongos or learn and play bongo del monte of changui, which uses a much lower tuning but it is not as straightforward to learn (or to find people who know how to play changui!). Listen to the tuning of the macho in the videos you posted and in Cambon's video and tune your macho lower than that the first time. Practice with that, then carefully try tuning it up A LITTLE at a time without music or noise in the background and make sure you are not bending any of the hooks or the bottom ring and lugs. Try a quarter turn of each nut once around, check the pitch and play it a while before taking it up anymore. You will get it but it may take weeks or months of focused practice. Playing son does not require playing as loud as playing salsa over amplified instruments and horns but it does not risk as much injuring your hands.
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Beatnik07 » Wed Jan 20, 2021 10:36 am

Thanks to Chtimulato and Jorge for these great suggests and ideas !

I guess learning bongos is a lot more than learning/memorizing patterns and accents.
The way the heads are struck is quite important for sound texture and dynamics: not only where the heads are struck (center, rim, etc..) but also the fingers position during the "impact". A slight difference in the way the phalanges are bent or where the finger pads hit the bongo head, all that change the sound.
Not only that, but assuming equal strike strength, a bongos player with long skinny fingers will probably create bongos sounds different from a player with fat, stubby fingers. And the player will have to compensate for that.

I find that bongos instruction, maybe, tends to focus on patterns and accents without paying enough attention to the role of the fingers detailed position and orientation at the moment of the strike. I suppose that as Chtimulato and jorge pointed out, this aspect is learned through experience, practice, and time.

But rock drummers using drumsticks have a "simpler" task since because the drumstick tip "stays the same", the strike is standardized, and only the strike position on the head, timing, and hit strength can vary. The bongos player on the other side use a "living" drumstick made of flesh and bones, and infinitely variable in its configuration.

Same thing with piano players: no matter how/where the finger hit a key, the sound stay the same since the piano mechanical action insure the string to be struck always the same way by the hammer (of course hitting a key harder or softer will vary the sound, but that's not the issue).
In fact playing a piano key (with the same strength) with a finger or a toe or a pencil produces exactly the same sound ...

Anyway, I am going to make use of the suggests in the two posts above !
Thanks again !
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Chtimulato » Wed Jan 20, 2021 2:27 pm

Yes, practice and practice.

I love to practice the martillo with these 2 tunes :

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy5-EQ7Ae_0[/youtube]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sSyDMYeASrY[/youtube]

This one is very tricky, and it's a cover of a Patti Austin tune :
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lLZOBf_Peg[/youtube]

Edit : my video links don't appear as videos like yours did. (???)
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby jorge » Thu Jan 21, 2021 1:09 pm

The sound you get from your bongos is personal, like the sound a trumpet or sax player gets from their horn. It depends as much on your technique as on the bongos, skins, tuning and other factors. When I practice, sometimes I like to just sit there with the drum, conga or bongo and no other music, and work on getting the prettiest, cleanest most musical sound I can. Then you can incorporate that into accompanying other music once you have a sound mastered.

Chtimulato that Patti Austin tune rocks, hadn't heard it in about 40 years, brings back memories. The late and great Ralph MacDonald on congas, Dave Valentin on flute (and timbales!) and Gwen Guthrie on background vocals. Our musical ancestors. Yeah, a bongo part could fit in there.
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Chtimulato » Thu Jan 21, 2021 4:03 pm

Chtimulato that Patti Austin tune rocks, hadn't heard it in about 40 years, brings back memories. The late and great Ralph MacDonald on congas, Dave Valentin on flute (and timbales!) and Gwen Guthrie on background vocals. Our musical ancestors. Yeah, a bongo part could fit in there.


I almost prefer the calypso inspired version of the late Radka Toneff - whom and which I discovered 40 years ago, in 1980. In fact, I've been knowing only this version for quite a while, till I hummed it to a bass player I was playing with back in the days, and he told me this tune had been covered by the Fania All Stars too. I never could find this cover though, but discovered relatively recently (in comparison to the 40 years :) ) that this tune was originally from Patti Austin.
BTW (wink to Thomas), this concert (and album) of Radka Toneff has been recorded in the Onkel Pö in Hamburg. :)
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Thomas Altmann » Thu Jan 21, 2021 9:48 pm

I must admit I'm not even familiar with the name of Radka Toneff.

Yeah, Onkel Pö ... I'm still sad it's gone, really! I saw so many great acts there; Joe Henderson, Dexter Gordon, Cedar Walton, Woody Shaw, Dizzy, Elvin, Max Roach, but also Double Image or Gary Burton with a very young Pat Metheny (in shorts!). Pat Metheny played there with his own quartet every once in a while; I think I was there one time. And of course Al Jarreau, whose career almost started at Onkel Pö's. And there was a spot for regional bands, too: I played there several times, mostly with modern jazz bands. I can't remember sitting there with congas or percussion; I think it was mostly drum set. There are some photos on the internet, and there's even a book out about Onkel Pö's Carnegie Hall, as it was called with it's full name. Back in the time everybody was smoking (tobacco). Though I don't really miss the smell in my clothes every next day, here was but one prohibition less than today.

@Beatnik: To the average listener, any drum stroke that is executed with a stick sounds fine anyway, and producing a clearly pitched note on a keyboard is certainly easier than on a violin. And there are drum set players (especially rock drummers) who don't make much of a difference, either. Even for me, at a certain period in the 80's, the drum set represented more a device (contraption) than an instrument, compared to hand drums. In reality, it just takes a special effort to actually make the stick drum an instrument that can speak like any hand drum. And there are more (and more elusive) parameters than the ones you mentioned, which actually determine the sound quality or versability of, say, a snare drum. They call it touch. And on the piano, it seems like a mystery to me: What makes Bill Evans sound like Bill Evans? Or compare Arturo Benedetti with Gieseking, both of them playing Debussy's piano works. It's like day and night, although they are both dealing with the same technology, the same mechanics.

This only as a side note ...

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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Chtimulato » Fri Jan 22, 2021 1:18 pm

I must admit I'm not even familiar with the name of Radka Toneff.


All I know about her is here :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radka_Toneff
And I've got the Live in Hamburg album... somewhere...
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Siete Leguas » Sun Jan 24, 2021 2:03 pm

Hello guys! It's been a long while since I last hung out in the forum - have been busy with other stuff and unfortunately pretty much away from drums and music. I hope everybody is doing well.

Nice topic! I also need to work on the sound of the bongó myself, especially the macho accents. The key to those nice loud sharp accents seems to be the technique where you hit your leg with the base of your palm while at the same time "whipping" your fingers onto the drum. Easier said than done - I haven't got that down yet!

Anyway, I have noticed in Beatnik's original post that two of the bongoseros play the accents on different sides of the clave. Carlos Cano from Cuba (second video) plays the first accent on the 3-side, while José Carlos Cubas from Spain (third video) does it on the 2-side. I once had a conversation with Thomas about which one is "right". If I remember correctly, Thomas said that the 2-side version seems to be the standard, at least nowadays, while the 3-side one was rather played in some old recordings and is much more rare these days. Interestingly, the Cuban instructor plays the non-standard way. @Thomas: please correct me if I'm wrong, it's been a while since we talked about it!

I guess that goes a bit off-topic, but I thought you might find it interesting, too!

@Chtimulato: in order to embed youtube videos in your posts like Beatnik did, click on "Share" on the youtube video page, then copy the "short" link (e.g. https://youtu.be/gy5-EQ7Ae_0) and paste it on your post between the youtube headers like you already did.

Salud!
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Thomas Altmann » Sun Jan 24, 2021 10:15 pm

Hi Siete Leguas! Nice to hear/read from you again!

I teach (and play) almost exactly the way the guy in the 3rd video plays, except for the left hand which I don't move that much. I'm not responsible for anybody else's way of playing, no matter where he/she is coming from. I know that my playing is correct, but I would not go as far as to say that somebody else's playing is wrong. Jerry Gonzalez had the knack of playing the tumbadora hembra on the 2-side of the clave occasionally, and he probably had a good reason for it. The acknowledged standard is without a doubt to play it on the 3-side. Reversing the accent pattern of the bongó evokes a quinto feel - at least for my ears. This could be the purpose of it. But maybe there wasn't any purpose involved. Music is an art, and you play the way you feel, and that's it.

I remember surfing through YouTube once, and after seeing Carlos Caro play for two seconds, I went on for the next clip. I don't care about someone's name or whatever. I'm not even saying that he can't play; I just don't like it. That's my personal, subjective judgement - not to be generalized. I must explain that my own style is particularly influenced by U.S. salsa, which in turn came from people like José Mangual and Armando Peraza, I suppose. Two of the main exponents of this style are/were Manny Oquendo and Johnny Rodriguez Jr. (among many others). Ray Romero played in the same way, and he claimed to have gotten it from Chano Pozo.

Greetings,
Thomas
Last edited by Thomas Altmann on Mon Jan 25, 2021 2:31 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Beatnik07 » Mon Jan 25, 2021 12:17 pm

On the topic of getting the right sound out of bongos, here is a pretty amazing bit of playing by Pakito Baeza ...
:shock:
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Beatnik07 » Mon Jan 25, 2021 12:35 pm

Thomas Altmann wrote:I remember surfing through YouTube once, and after seeing Carlos Caro play for two seconds, I went on for the next clip. I don't care about someone's name or whatever. I'm not even saxing that he can't play; I just don't like it.


Hi Thomas, I know these two Carlos Caro videos, are you referring to one of these in your post ?


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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Thomas Altmann » Mon Jan 25, 2021 2:22 pm

Hi Beatnik,

Hi Thomas, I know these two Carlos Caro videos, are you referring to one of these in your post ?


No, I think it was the LP-video you listed in your first post. I apologize for not researching YouTube as diligently as many other people do (and that seems to include you). So I just had a glimpse into the first of the two Carlos Caro videos in your last post, and it looked and sounded O.K. to me.

You know, I had the same problem with Tomás Cruz' conga videos, which in turn offended the editor of his method books, Kevin Moore. I think, if you publish something that is supposed to be educational, you have to choose a "central" technique that represents a good foundation for the student to go any direction he wants in his personal artistic career. This often implies altering and discarding some of the teachings. A teacher has to spend some thoughts on the question: What is the best basic starting point to enable the student to find his personal approach to master the requirements of the art? In the case of Tomás Cruz it was his cup-hand /grabbing slap technique that I found was neither up to date nor beneficial for a student to emulate. That does not mean that I disrespect Cruz as a player. There are many great drummers who don't have the best technique, or who haven't studied the tradition as much as they should, or whatever. And I am studying these drummers for what they really have to offer instead, like a superior rhythmic concept, or extraordinary musicality. Kevin Moore, by the way, did a fantastic job in compiling the teachings of modern Cuban musicians. His timba.com site is a prime resource for everything related to modern Cuban popular music.

I think it's similar with Carlos Caro. He may be a great player if you place him in a band context. Good sound! And he seems to be a nice guy. But if you put out an instructional video, a valid clave concept should be central. If it is not there, I turn away and go on. You know what? Chances are he would even like to rectify it today!

I hope that explains my standpoint that might look over-critical otherwise.

Thomas

P.S.: Sorry for my typos; my eyes are getting worse.
Last edited by Thomas Altmann on Mon Jan 25, 2021 2:33 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Getting the macho to sound dry and snappy ...

Postby Thomas Altmann » Mon Jan 25, 2021 2:29 pm

One of the bongo videos that impressed me the most recently, is this one:



This man did his homework ...

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