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Is anyone here familiar with the use of the West African gita (calabash gourd drum)


blue2blue

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I've become a bit intoxicated by the stripped down cargo cult guitar blues of West Africa and Mali in particular. A large part of the sound of this music is the rhythmic foundation provided by gita drums -- typically half a dried calabash gourd with no skin head and typically with beads or knobs around the edge which can be used for percussion. The gourd is inverted and slapped, tapped, and stroked by the player, who will typically have a ring or rings on his fingers to create sharp, higher pitched percussive sounds that take a similar role to that of the hi hat in a trap kit.

 

The popularity of the music means one can now get gitas for less than a hundred dollars from various online percussion stores. But it seems a bit pig-in-poke to me. Has anyone had any experience?

 

(And after that, it's the DIY kora kit for me... LOL.)

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This is the more primitive version of a middle eastern Doumbek. I am unfamiliar with the lineage of ancestry in these hand drums, but they all aspire to a similar hand held, portable "all in one" tone producing package.

 

I have seen some pretty amazing sounds come out of these types of drums.

 

D

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Thanks, Dendy! I guess, you know, you got a big calabash gourd, cut it in half and dry it out and you got a bowl with it facing up -- and a gita with it facing down... biggrin.gif

 

Kinda primal.

 

I suppose I was just hoping to hear first hand from someone who'd bought (or 'made') one.

 

As noted, I've been listening to a lot of W. African music and the calabash half-gourd drums are a big part of the sound, along with the kora and, often enough, guitars, both acoustic and electric.

 

I think one thing I find really interesting and compelling is how BIG these things sound, at least miked up. I'm listening on NS10's now, but when I turn on my Evenet 20/20bas, the very low bass in the gourd drum can be really powerful. (And on occasion, over-powerful; I've heard some tracks that sounded like they were mastered on bass-shy speakers.)

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I don't have much experience with the Gita, but I love the mali style percussion. I play the dunduns which is a set of 3 drums (kenkeni, sangban and dundunba) typically used as the "bass section" in an ensemble. Most of my training has been with master drummers from guinea in the mande style, but i fell in love with the minimalist style of the dunduns used in mali. I would definitely say it's more bluesy in mali and more jazzy in guinea.

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Strangely enough, i don't really have many recordings of my band playing. We focused our energy on live performance...so we have a ton of performance experience, not so much recording experience, which is common in that style given the strong oral-based traditions. I have some audio recordings of my band playing that were done for learning purposes that i can throw up when i get a chance, but i have some way more interesting and advanced stuff from others i have studied with that hopefully will leave terms like primitive and primal at the door smiley-wink

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Strangely enough' date=' i don't really have many recordings of my band playing. We focused our energy on live performance...so we have a ton of performance experience, not so much recording experience, which is common in that style given the strong oral-based traditions. I have some audio recordings of my band playing that were done for learning purposes that i can throw up when i get a chance, but i have some way more interesting and advanced stuff from others i have studied with that hopefully will leave terms like primitive and primal at the door smiley-wink[/quote']

Anything you could put up or point us to would be great!

 

I've been fascinated in particular by how the drummers make the gita (and perhaps other half-gourd drums) into a multi-timbral thing by tapping with their rings, getting a (plenty) deep kick drum type foundation and then doing 'topside' percussion with the rings... the minimalism of the drumming combined with the basic minimalism of the guitars (not that people don't step out or keep busy, of course) proves hypnotic to me. I love the way African and African-American traditions seem to have intertwined in the development of modern Malian blues.

 

I'm also quite in love with the super-sophisticated yet very roots-inspired music of Rokia Traore as well as the haunting pop of Fatoumata Diawara.

 

Maybe my next enthusiasm should be to re-explore Guinean music, too.

 

I just put on some El Hadj Djeli Sory Kouyaté and Keletigui Et Ses Tambourinis in my subscription service.

 

I'm listening to the latter, now, and the current track, "Saratan," is really a delight. Funky but as sunny as beautiful spring day. The rolling rhythms of the balafon are particularly intoxicating.

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An interesting sidebar discussion (sub-thread, if you will) developed within a recent thread on bass-heavy contemporary mixes at another recording site -- basically beginning with an asterisked footnote in the post that this link [below] will take the user to... You have to jump around a little (skipping on-topic posts, basically ;) ) to follow it. The main participants are members Funny Cat and Samc. There's quite a bit of confusion on terms early on (since the two were each familiar with different African sub-cultures) but I found it all fascinating.

 

https://www.gearslutz.com/board/so-m...l#post11857145

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I'm a guitar player, but I have more junk to beat on and bang on than most.

 

I have a Djembe, made by remo. The only reason I got the Remo one instead of the Meini on with the natural skin is that the Remo one is pretty indestructible and tunable. Lots of fun until my hand go numb.I have a Cajon too. You can do a lot of cool rhythms and beat on those too.

 

Do bother getting a foot pedal for your cajon. All the ones I have tried are cheap crap.

 

Get a double bass pedal ad mod it.

 

[video=youtube;EDI3wjzquQc]

 

 

 

 

 

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