Help me pick out a djembe drum...

I'm looking to get a cheap djembe drum to beat around on at home. My main question has to do with the tuning of them. Some are pretuned, some are turned with ropes, and some are key tuned. I imagine that key tuned are the easiest to tune. Are djembes difficult to tune (with ropes or key)? What about pretuned ones...do they go out of tune and what do you do if they do?

I'd like to keep this under $150. I see that Remo makes a fairly small one (10" head) with key tuners for $140. However, I could get one with a bigger head (and bigger sound I assume) for cheaper...but they are either pretuned or have rope tuning.

Also, what are the tonal differences between a djembe and a doumbek? M123 carries a tunable doumbek for $100.

As I understand it:

Djembe = big african drum. Usually made out of wood.

Doumbek = little persian drum, belly dance instrument. Often made out of ceramic or tin. (Darbuka, same thing?)

Same shape. Different sizes and compositions. I have the Remo Djembe and a tin doumbek from a company in California. As different in sound as two drums can be.

For Djembes, I really like the Remo product. Solid, dependable, easy to tune. I'm not sure if they come in under your budget... It's been about 10 years or so since I bought mine. There was a guy who posted some semi-spam here a few weeks ago who was hawking a line of hand-made maple djembes with Bob Marley branding on them... They also had a Grateful Dead line that had been personally approved by Mickey Hart. Say what you will bout Mick, the man knows what a Djembe is supposed to sound like. You can do a search on that, if you like.

/willy

Edit: Re-reading your original... 10" is a pretty small djembe, IMO. You won't get that big meaty "DUUM" sound out of it... I think mine is a 16... Very versatile.

/w

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Meinl-Aluminum-Doumbek?sku=445467

i never liked the fact that my doumbek was ceramic. i was too afraid to take it outside when i kick it with people.

i need sumthin tough and durable so i can take it on long excursions with the hobos on main st. and sit down with a turned over hat hoping for spare change.

didnt like doing with a ceramic.....wish i got this.

im with aqua on this one.

street corner music makes gooooood money

i mean, doing it twice got me an export with pinstripes:D

Thanks for the info. What about the whole tuning thing? I could get a much bigger head if I went with rope or pretuned. But I don't want something that'll be a huge hassle, especially since I'm not very experienced with these things.

These are some that I'm looking at in addition to the Remo (10") with key tuners.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Toca-Freestyle-Cannon-Djembe-with-Bag?sku=449859

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Toca-Vryheid-Djembe?sku=447041

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Toca-Vuur-Djembe?sku=447042

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/Toca-Synergy-Freestyle-Djembe?sku=447040

I'm kind of leaning toward the first (the 14" one) as it has a bigger head. I could also have MF match it from another website for $119. Any ideas?

I've also found some cool looking ones on eBay. What do you guys think about these? They claim to professionally tune them before shipment. Would they be durable? What's the deal with wood vs synthetic materials? I only plan to play this inside if that makes a difference.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140035394527&fromMakeTrack=true

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=004&item=140036848637&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&rd=1

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ih=004&item=140036502172&rd=1&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&rd=1

Also, what do you tune on djembes? Is it just so it's consistent with the same tension all the way around or something? Is it hard to do with ropes?