<\/picture><\/figure>\n\n\n\nIn this case, the 1st, 4th, and 5th notes in this measure are accented. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
How to Play an Accent on a Bongo Drum<\/h3>\n\n\n\n How to make an accent on a bongo drum? Don’t you just hit the drum harder? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well, not exactly. You can<\/em> do that, but it turns out that our brains perceive pitch way better than we perceive volume. You can probably tell the difference when someone hits a drum quietly and when they do it loudly, but it turns out you might not be able to tell the difference between striking the drum loudly and striking more<\/em> loudly. Hitting the bongo drum harder without any technique doesn’t work for accents.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nYou’ll find though that if you strike the drum with your fingers and then pulling them off quickly creates a higher, more resonant tone. If you do this closer to the rim of the drum, you will get more resonance and therefore your note will be better perceived as an accent.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nOn the other hand (ba doom psh), if you want to mute <\/strong>your bongo tone, you can experiment with different strikes and snapping your fingers off the drums to get different resonances. <\/p>\n\n\n\nMute Slaps, Heel\/Toe, and Open Tones<\/h2>\n\n\n\n This is where bongo notation can vary wildly. The only time you’ll see this is if you’re trying to learn a bongo specific rhythm, as many scores don’t put details on how to hit the bongo drum. For example, the extremely popular Martillo rhythm features mute slaps, heel\/toes, and open tones. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mute Strike: <\/strong>When you are deadening the slap of the drum with one hand and you slap the edge of the drum with the other hand<\/li>Heel\/Toe<\/strong>: Striking the drum with your thumb, driving into the drum is the heel<\/strong>, while the toe is produced by rocking your hand to strike the drum with the fingers on the opposite side of your hand. (like your pinky, ring, and middle fingers). Whether you are striking with the heel or the toe it is a similar sound. <\/li>Open Tones: <\/strong>are when you strike the edge of the bongo drum producing an open resonating tone. <\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\nThe notation for the different types of tones from a bongo is all over the place<\/strong>. It completely depends on who is writing the rhythm. Some bypass using musical notations altogether and instead just put letters up above the note. For example, the S above the note in this figure is notation for a “slap”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture><\/figure>\n\n\n\nFortunately, drum rhythm makers often will give you a legend so you can interpret the meaning of the notation. Here’s a couple examples that I’ve seen:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Heel\/Toe Examples<\/h3>\n\n\n\n I’ve seen the heel\/toe movement expressed like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture>One notation showed both heel and toe as “rhythmic slashes”<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nAnother example:<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture>The toe<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nAnd the Heel here: <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture>The Heel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nMuted Strike Examples<\/h3>\n\n\n\n Just like the heel toe variations, there are many ways people choose to notate a muted hit\/strike<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture>Muted Strike<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nAnother example:<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/picture>Muted Strike with a double sharp symbol<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\nOpen Note Notation<\/h3>\n\n\n\n You might see an open note with no additional notation at all, or you may see one with an “O” on top of the note to signify “Open”. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Bongo Technique Notation Summary<\/h3>\n\n\n\n In practice, you will see any number of notations being used, hopefully this gives you an idea of what you might expect to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Can Bongos Be Played with Sticks?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\nIf you’re just starting playing bongos, one thing to know is how they are played. Bongos are meant to be a hand drum, first and foremost. However, there are alternatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As a drummer, you can play anything with sticks, including the kitchen counter! But you have to be prepared to face the consequences. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I remember when I was in band, I heard that you should never ever play bongo drums with sticks unless you wanted to tear the bongo drum heads. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Frankly though, the only reason you wouldn’t want to play a bongo drum with sticks is to extend the life of the drum head. The drum heads are either made with animal skins or from a synthetic material, and they definitely can withstand some of the sharper impact from a drumstick, but the longevity of your drum head is probably going to be much lower if you do this often.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nI’ve had my entry-level bongos for over 13 years at the time of this writing and I’ve never had to replace the heads, and I don’t use drumsticks on the bongo drum heads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, many drummers<\/strong> will play bongo drums with their drum sticks regularly–it definitely is done, you just need to be okay with a greater possibility of having to replace the heads more often. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
So you want to play the bongos, eh? Playing rhythms by ear is a common way to learn, but learning to play bongos is a lot easier if you can<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":54,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2],"tags":[],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":3,"label":"Bongos"},{"value":2,"label":"Instruments"}]},"featured_image_src_large":["https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/lp-aspire-bongos-white-background-e1570335065240-1024x768.jpg",640,480,true],"author_info":{"display_name":"Peter Mitchell","author_link":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/author\/thesoundadventurer\/"},"comment_info":0,"category_info":[{"term_id":3,"name":"Bongos","slug":"bongos","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":3,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":2,"count":23,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":3,"category_count":23,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Bongos","category_nicename":"bongos","category_parent":2},{"term_id":2,"name":"Instruments","slug":"instruments","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":2,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":105,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":2,"category_count":105,"category_description":"","cat_name":"Instruments","category_nicename":"instruments","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":702,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46\/revisions\/702"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/soundadventurer.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}