Conga drums are an integral part of most Latin American music. In North America, everybody has heard of a conga line and unfortunately, the majority of us happen to be forced to join 1 at 1 point or an additional, often throughout a wedding reception. However the music from the conga is far also diverse to become pigeonholed as wedding reception music. These instruments are employed not only in genres like salsa and rumba, but in Afro-Caribbean religious music too. Conga drums are an extremely essential facet of life in South America.
The bodies of conga drums are “staved,” or made of several strips of wood or fiberglass, equivalent for the construction of a barrel. Possibilities are that the ancestors of contemporary congas had been, actually, created from salvaged barrels. The drum heads are of rawhide or synthetic components and are screw-tensioned. The height of the typical conga drum is about 3 feet, and also the instruments are often played in sets of two to 4. They are able to be played from either a sitting or standing position, though for the latter, the drums has to be mounted on a rack. An artist who plays conga is named a “conguero.”
Although the typical height of a conga drum is about three feet, there is certainly really sufficient size variation to warrant distinct names for various sized drums. Nonetheless, there is some confusion more than these names. 1 supply maintains that the drums are called, in order of largest to smallest, the “tumba,” the “conga,” the “quinto,” the “requinto” as well as the “Ricardo,” the last becoming named for Desi Arnaz’s character of Ricky Ricardo on “I Really like Lucy.”
An additional source calls the largest the “tumba,” but refers to the smallest as the “nino” and offers no names for the middle sizes. Nonetheless other names include the “segundo” and the “supertumba.” Clearly, there is certainly no standardized set of names. Even the term “conga drum” can occasionally be confusing. Although some experts sustain “conga” could be employed in each English and Spanish, other individuals aver that it should be utilized only in English and that “tumbadoras” ought to be used in Spanish. All and all, it can be quite bewildering.
But there is certainly absolutely nothing confusing concerning the rhythms of the conga drums. To produce these rhythms, congueros use 5 basic tones and strategies: the open tone, the muffled tone, the bass tone, the slap, and the touch.
The open tone is precisely what its name implies-a clear resonant tone with a distinct pitch created by striking four fingers near the rim from the head. The muffled tone is like the open tone, however the fingers are held against the head to muffle the sound. The bass tone is produced by striking the head with all the complete palm in the hand. The slap approach produces a popping sound, and also the touch, once again because the name implies, is a technique of barely touching the fingers or the heel of the hand towards the drum head. A final method exists in which the conguero uses his elbow to apply pressure How to play the Conga drums different components in the head. This really is not a traditional method, nevertheless it is commonly employed in contemporary salsa and rumba.
As pointed out, the character of Ricky Ricardo helped popularize the conga, even though the instrument he played on the show was truly more similar for the Cuban “boku,” yet another kind of drum. The music from the conga remains popular right now, in component as a result of present popularity of Latin music and Latin ballroom dances.