Gon Bops

    Here on the West Coast, no other drum recalls the years past like Gon Bops! Made in Los Angeles California,  these excellent drums can be seen everywhere. I have seen photos of every famous conguero playing Gon Bops; from Mongo to Peraza, Barreto to Aguabella. Gon Bops grace the cover of many a vintage album, from R&B to salsa, latin jazz to acid rock. Before LP, Gon Bops were the drum to have. And Gon Bops can still be seen everywhere; at rumbas, drum circles, classes, etc.

      These particular Gon Bops were just dropped off at my house this very morning to receive skins form my favorite supplier, my man Micheal over at L&H percussion. This set of Gon Bops has such a wonderful patina of use. Just look at this tumba;

   This drum has been used but not abused! Played but not waylayed! Look at the scrapes caused by dozens of feet tapping the beat! Look at the golden hue of the aged wood that still sounds so good! The metal might have a little rust, but it won't bust! The bands are still tight and no cracks anywhere, though the tumba is a little egged shaped on the top, it still sounds great! What makes this old set of congas even more special is that they are a matching set bought together and never separated, just like a romantic elderly couple growing old together but still with a twinkle in their eye and a spring in their step.

  This particular set is made from what is referred to as mahogany, which is actually Phillipine luan wood. This wood is very light in weight, and drums made from this wood are never heavy. What is so great about this wood is it creates a nice mellow tone that is never too loud or bright, just what you need for a nice sounding rumba. You never have to ask people to keep it down for the singer when playing these old mahogany Gon Bops. Gon Bops also made the quinto just the right size for rumba too, a nice tight little 9.5" that gets the tone you need for a good rumba quinto.

    Gon Bops made several styles and models of drums back in the day. I myself have an oak Gon Bops tres dos that I pair with a Valje tumba. This set up appeals to me as Valje is just as significant to the history of California percussion as Gon Bops. Also of course, Akbar Moghaddam is making the modern version of Gon Bops, which is ironic as Akbar used to be involved in making Valjes, who were Gon Bops main competitor at the time.

   Anyways, if rumba is what you are into, you could do a lot worse than  a set of vintage mahogany Gon Bops. They are such a nice sounding fun drum, that for me always recalls images of the early days of Afro-Cuban percussion in my home state of California.

 

  Seriously, is there anything more fun than talking about old drums? Well, except for playing them?

Los Munequitos de Matanzas

Oh yes, yes, yes! Looks like Los Munequitos de Matanzas is coming to San Francisco and guess who has tickets! That's right I do. They are performing at Mission High School right here in San Francisco just a quick walk from my house. Mission H.S. is right across from Dolores Park which is the home of the rumba and Afro-Cuban scene here in S.F., with several of Santana's drummer's playing there, including John Santos, who tells the story of getting arrested there for playing rumba back in the day, so Mission H.S. is a totally appropriate venue and location!

I'm really looking forward to seeing the show and writing about it. Who knows, I may end up with a few sound files somehow "wink, wink".

Here's the link and info to the show, it's being put on as part of the San Francisco International Arts Festival.

Los Muñequitos de Matanzas presents Tambor de Fuego

San Francisco, CA

Los Muñequitos de Matanzas presents Tambor de Fuego
From 1992- 2002, Los Muñequitos thrilled U.S. audiences and built a devoted fan base with their performances and workshops throughout the country (the company performed at Mission High School in San Francisco in 1992).  Finally, after nine long years,  Los Munequitos return to the U.S. in April-May 2011 with a brand new program: Tambor de Fuego, featuring work from their latest recording, tributes to legendary members and new pieces created especially for this eagerly awaited tour.

Hailed as the "reigning regents of rumba" by the San Francisco Chronicle, "the essence of Cuba's musical soul" by the San Diego Union Tribune and "truly keepers of a sacred flame" by Latin Beat, Los Muñequitos de Matanzas are amongst the highest regarded percussionists in the world and masters of Afro-Cuban ritual and rumba music and dance. Founded in 1952, the group currently spans three generations of an extended family of musicians, singers and dancers.

The music of Los Muñequitos de Matanzas keeps alive 500 years of drumming, chanting and dance, preserving the vibrant culture of the African Diaspora intrinsic to Cuba's living legacy.  While sustaining these cultural traditions, the group's choreography and new musical compositions continue to innovate from the African roots of Cuban culture.  In one evening's concert, Los Muñequitos may play the rhythms and drumming of the Santeria religion which originated with the Yoruba tribe; the songs of the Abakuá, a secret fraternal organization originally from Nigeria; and contemporary Cuban rumba in its varied and ever evolving forms.

Los Muñequitos has performed in more than 50 cities across the U.S., from intimate (and packed!) shows in community centers and dance & music clubs to full-scale theatrical productions in grand concert halls.  Whatever the setting, their complex drumming, captivating vocals and spectacular dancing transport audiences to the vital streets of Matanzas and the soul of Cuba.

Dates

Start: Monday Apr 04, 2011 7:00 PM End: Monday Apr 04, 2011 9:30 PM

Prices

$15.00 - $50.00

Location

Mission High School 3750 18th Street San Francisco, CA 94114 United States

Some lovely new claves

Well the postman arrived with some lovely new claves, and a guagua. Handmade in Belize by Isla Percussions. Seems like not a moment too soon. If you bloggers remember one of my more recent posts, my current set of claves had seen better days.

 

Anyways, I'm very happy to get these new claves, made from some exotic tropical Belize hardwood I don't even know the name of. I've spent a little time tapping away on them, trying to find the best pairs of machos and hembras. There is nothing worse than a bad sounding set of claves, cuz you're going to have to listen to them the entire rumba. Lucky for me they all sound great. They look great, and they are nice and light so they feel great too. Ah, no more splinters or nasty dirty tape on my claves for a while at least.

The guagua sounds great too. It seems to be made from 2 types of wood. I'm usually partial to the sound of bamboo and I've been making all my own guaguas from bamboo. But I'm willing to give this little guy a chance. It has a great sound, dry and cutting, not too shrill. I guess I'm going to have to figure out how to make a stand for it, I can't see holding it between the legs like I do with my bamboo ones.

Adios Totico, Vaya con dios.

It is with great sadness that I write this post. Sadly the great rumbero Eugenio "Totico" Arango has passed away.  I am sure most of my readers will be familiar with Totico through his landmark collaboration with Patato.

My cohorts in the blogosphere have written excellent articles on Totico's passing. You can learn more about this influential rumbero by visiting their blogs.


Sentimiento Manana

Fidel's Eyeglasses

Sentimiento Manana contributor Willie "El Ruso" Everich has had the great honor to play alongside Totico. Mark Sanders at Fidel's Eyeglasses has written a great post showcasing many rare albums that Totico has contributed to along with some musical track.


Ibae, Totico.

These claves have been played!

Is what I heard a fellow rumbero exclaim a month back at the Dio De Los Muertes rumba we have every year hear in San Francisco's own Mission District. It brings a few rumberos from  other cities in the Bay Area that I don't play with too often, which is of course where that exclamation about my claves came from.
 
Anyways, the Dio De Los Muertes parade I can say it is a fantastic event, with several thousand people all dressed in full costumes, and different processions of musicians and dancers, including several Escoles de Samba as they are so well suited for parades. The rumba was based in the park, and at times we had a couple hundred people around us. I myself played for nearly 5 hours, switching from drum to drum or instrument to instrument and also singing coro as best I can. The highlight for me was playing quinto while marking the steps of a woman in full "muertes" costume dancing on stilts to the rumba.

Here is my original post with my claves. You can see what a years worth of rumba does to the instruments. The dark ones are my favorite and you can see the striker/macho is worn almost half through, and is taped to avoid getting splinters. I really need some new ones, but good sounding claves are so hard to find. My old supplier is out of business, and I keep trying out the mass made ones in stores by LP and Meinl, etc. What can I say? I find their sound less than appealing.

La Rumba Es Para Todo Del Mundo.

   Rumba has it's origins in Cuba, of that there can be no doubt. It may have had influences from Africa and Spain, and from such diverse peoples as several African tribes, Andalusians, Spaniards, Moors and Gypsies, however it was created in Cuba, by Cubans and arguably for Cubans.

     However, even in Cuba there exists geographical stylistic variations. The most famous of which are the differences between the rumba styles of Matanzas and Havana. 

  Recently rumba has escaped the confines of it's island home and traveled the world. It seems at no other time has the popularity of rumba been greater, or the study of it easier. There exists several excellent texts on the subject, videos of rumba are easily viewed, modern and older rumba recordings are easily available and instruction on the music style is easily obtained either live or through online videos.

  In comparison, the great music called jazz originated in the United States of America. It also had a great many influences, and regional variations, similar to rumba. Jazz is enjoyed the world over, indeed, it has been adopted by the world to such an extent that it can no longer be called an American music, in my opinion, truly jazz has become an international art form. The fantastic jazz music performed in such countries as Japan, Italy and other world countries are just as legitimate expressions of the music as that found here in America. Each country always seems to throw their own spin on jazz music, which is only correct, as each performer should give an honest expression of themselves. Jazz has benefited from this tremendously.

  Is rumba different? Will other legitimate regional variations and expressions of the rumba musical form evolve that differ from the Cuban archetype? Or will the only legitimate form of rumba to be considered be the Cuban model?

  Rumba has traveled the world and is becoming an international music as. The evidence is here for me to see on my blog, as I receive visitors from literally all over the world. Will these rumberos place their own personalities and experiences aside and play as if they were "Cuban"? Or will these artists eventually instill their distinct personalities and experiences into the music we call rumba and play it a new way?

The Clave Matrix and Rumba Quinto

I recently acquired copies of two monumental books addressing clave and rumba. The first two books in the Unlocking Clave series: The Clave Matrix and Rumba Quinto, both written by California's own rumba researcher; the intrepid David Peñalosa. As these books are the first two in David's "Unlocking Clave" series, I assume there will be more books in the Unlocking Clave series yet to come.

The Clave Matrix has been out for a little while, and Rumba Quinto will be released soon. I was fortunate to get a preliminary copy of that book.

I'm just about through the first book "The Clave Matrix", which has been a very enjoyable study. I'll be posting a review of The Clave Matrix shortly. Later on you can expect a review of Rumba Quinto as well, but one book at a time.

   David has made a Facebook album with some of the graphics and images he used for The Clave Matrix, including some great images of Cal Tjader and Tito Puente.

A tasty little Yambu.

   I was playing a guaguanco with a friend the other day, just him improvising on a quinto and tres dos, with me holding it down on the salidor. Actually the tempo was more like a yambu. I wanted to add some strokes to my basic guaguanco to fill it out the rhythm as the other player was improvising, and I came up with adding all muff tones to the back side. I was really trying to swing it alone as we didn't have palitos. The rhythm started to really swing when I gave the phrases the feeling of starting with the open (O) tone on one side of the clave ending with the either the last bass (B) or muff (M) tone on the other side, and then starting a new phrase with the next open (O) tone, etc.

   Actually, this is exactly the way Michael Spiro teaches it in his book. What do you know? It works!

    The different tone quality of the muff tones on one side and bass tones on the other created a sweet little call and response feel, like a quick little conversation. Anyways, I really dug the feel of it. I tried it out later with when we had a third player on the tres dos, and it works with that part as well. The tones of the muffs sort of accent the higher pitch of the tres dos open tones that coincide with them, working with the tres dos, instead of playing over it.

So here's the transcription. I haven't seen the part written like this anywhere before. Try it out and let me know how it goes. Just click on the image a couple times to enlarge it. Feel free to print it out and play.

Aqui, Entre Las Flores

  Well I finally got some pictures of the bajo cajon I built a few days ago. A very fun project. I ended up going with the "Clave y Guaguanco" model. I originally wanted to go with a different size, but as I was making one for my friend at the same time, the economy of the wood made me change my mind.

My friend wanted a slightly larger model for more bass. Oddly enough, the two cajons sound very similar, with the bigger one being a bit louder.

Anyways, I was going for a kind of retro look, what with the leather trunk handle. I originally got the handle for an old drum restoration, but it didn't look quite right. Two years later the handle finds a home. The drawer pulls for the feet were also a fun idea to kind of complete the look. I'm planning on keeping this cajon around the living room, so that is the main reason for the look. Nothing wrong with plain cajons at all.

So this is my "Yambu setup". The bass cajons really add to a nice yambu. The dry and low cajon sounds don't get in the way of the vocals at all, which are so important to yambu. Just listen to some Carlos Embale to see what I mean. Yambu also has a quinto, often a cajon as well, but one cajon is enough for me. The funky look and quieter sound of my Isla quinto is the perfect companion for this cajon. I'm also planning on going to some flea markets and getting some old tarnished silver spoons for playing "cucharas" (palitos) on the top as well.

The artwork is some art nouveaus  flash I had. I enlarged it in Photoshop, printed it out and then traced it onto the wood using graphite paper. I dug out my old architecture school supplies for the painting and drawing and such. It was kind of fun to combine my college architecture education with my construction experience to make an instrument for my musical hobbies. I hadn't done this kind of graphic work by hand in a while so I was a little nervous and rusty, but it was very enjoyable. I wasn't sure how it was going to come out, I was hoping for a masterpiece, but expecting a disaster.

I was going to write a big article on cajons but there are others that I've used for inspiration and information that have written much better articles than I'm capable of. First without a doubt would be Thomas Altman who has very a wonderful article on cajons. Thomas' article also contains detailed construction directions.

Cajons by Thomas Altmann

Another great resource is the article by the percussionist Jorge Santos, who has written an article called "The Cuban Rumba Box". Available as a free PDF download.

Also Barry Cox has a beautiful article on Guarapachangeo, Los Chinitos and the cajons they use.

A cajón used by "Los Chinitos"
Photo: Antoine Miniconi

I also referred with Patricio Banchereau, who is an associate of Barry Cox's and runs several blogs on rumba mentioned here before. The beautiful decorations on the cajons he made for his students inspired me to decorate my own cajon. Patricio shared with me some excellent advice on cajons, a portion of which I will paste here:

One last things I'd like to add: the main sound element is your hand!!
You may be aware of that already, but in every style of Cuban percussion you have to stick your strokes and keep the hand on the instrument until you give another stroke. 90 percent of Cubans play like that (not everyone) - clave, timbal, bongo, congas, bata, catá, even bells, whatever, that's what I teach - nobody ever talks about that obviously, in some cases you can't (open strokes with stick in hand like timbal or arará or bembé) and the faster you play, the more impossible it becomes to do that to me the cajón is one of the instruments in which this method is very important - especially for bass tones but even for open strokes and slaps on the corners. Once you understand that, you have more chances to get a good sound - this is my theory and no Cuban ever taught me that - only careful observation for years just watch and you'll see - did u see El Niño from Muñequitos tocando clave (he just caresses the clave)?

Patrico's cajons.

 There are others I'd like to thank as well. Marc Hough for his excellent cajon. Dan Callis for sure, sharing all the information on his cajon from Pancho Quinto.

Cajon by Marc Hough

I'm looking forward to playing this instrument. It was a lot of fun to make. I may be making more some time. I'm still interested in making a "Pancho Quinto" model as well.

an afrocuban discography

Well it looks as if the indomitable Barry Cox has done it again. Barry has begun a new blog an afrocuban discography , an online catalog of exactly what you'd expect, Afrocuban music with beautifully scanned album covers, print dates, track listings, reissues, artists, recording company, etc.

This new blog is very nicely done. In addition to Barry's other blogs Vamos a Guarachar , El Cancionero Rumbero and his colleague Patricio's La Rumba no Es Como Ayer we have a veritable online encyclopedia of rumberos. songs, histories and now musical recordings of Cuban rumba and folkloric music.