Posted: Wed Feb 14, 2007 8:51 am
When the Djembé is looked at as a percussion instrument in general, there are in fact a lot of techniques that one can use, I personally play them even with sticks or my whiskers (some kind of brushes, but in plastic, to protect the goat-skin). Awesome slap!
In is's traditional, West-African context, the Djembé comes in Ensembles with up to three bassdrum players (Kenkeni / Sangban / Doundoun) and additional Djembé-players. There are many traditional arrangements that have their original background (field work / celebrations / rituals / religious context etc.) Every drum-voice of the Ensemble is more or less fixed and is not variated much by the Ensemble. The rhythms themselves, yes they differ from one village to the other.
In that context, mainly the Djembé soloist is somewhat free to step out of the traditional rhythms, stretching time, dynamics and speed and of course using additional techniques for his slaps and the other beats. Mainly there, we find that it is not so much about technique itself, but more about playing through ones ears. As well as we do not find much originally transcripted notes, most of that job was done in the past few years by "western" visitors.
Greetings to all, freezing at around 0°C
In is's traditional, West-African context, the Djembé comes in Ensembles with up to three bassdrum players (Kenkeni / Sangban / Doundoun) and additional Djembé-players. There are many traditional arrangements that have their original background (field work / celebrations / rituals / religious context etc.) Every drum-voice of the Ensemble is more or less fixed and is not variated much by the Ensemble. The rhythms themselves, yes they differ from one village to the other.
In that context, mainly the Djembé soloist is somewhat free to step out of the traditional rhythms, stretching time, dynamics and speed and of course using additional techniques for his slaps and the other beats. Mainly there, we find that it is not so much about technique itself, but more about playing through ones ears. As well as we do not find much originally transcripted notes, most of that job was done in the past few years by "western" visitors.
Greetings to all, freezing at around 0°C