Djembe Lesson for Beginners: How to play a tone sound – African Drumming Online

Next sound we’re going to look at is a tone. So, basic idea – it’s on the edge of the
drum, and you’re using the full length of your fingers. So, as a rough guide, you’re aiming for
this paddy bit here, between your palm and your first knuckle. So, if you’ve got some padding there, that’s
sort of where should be on the edge of the drum. And the idea is, hand starting back here,
bring your wrist back, not just lifting your arms up like this, so making sure you’re
getting your wrist involved, right at the start – will keep you in good practise for
later – lifting your hand back, hand comes down, hits with full face of the fingers from
where the impact is, you can see from the overhead shot, roughly there on the edge of
the drum, and hits with the full face of the fingers and your hand comes off the drum,
letting the sound ring out, like this… So that’s a tone… So, when you’re singing the rhythms, tones
generally will be something like ‘ding’ or ‘ting’, so remember for the bass you
had ‘goong’, tone would be ‘ding’.

It changes a bit, but you’ll get the idea. So, if I’m going ding ding… Like that, two tones. So, remember, if you’re practising it, and
you’re being really careful of your technique – 3 main points to think about. One is making sure your hand comes back here,
so when you’re practising slowly, notice my wrist is bent back, so my wrist isn’t
locked, wrist is moving the whole time, so wrist is back, arms aren’t, you can lift
your arms up high if you want, but you don’t have to for now – the higher you lift your
arms the more power you get. So, wrist back, as you come down making sure
you’re hitting with the full surface of your fingers, not having too far forward – if
it’s too far forward you’ll get this sort of sound… so if you’re hearing sort of
a muted, paddy sound, probably means your fingers are a little bit too far forward,
you’re probably hitting with this part of your fingers.

The other way you don’t want to do is if
you wrist is too far back, and your fingers are too tight… You can still get a good sound, but you’re
really only hitting with this bit of your hand, and it won’t be as full a sound. So the difference is this… Versus this… So, hopefully you can hear that. If you can’t, just take my word for it. So, you want to make sure all of your fingers,
from the edge of the drum to where they finish is all touching the drum at once. So, first thing: wrist back, second thing:
touching all the drum at once with your fingers, and third thing: making sure your hand comes
back here to where it started so the sound can ring out… like that..

So you’re not playing like this… you’re
making sure after you play your hand comes back here… like that… And that’s tones. – Learn how to play djembe and other African
drumming with African Drumming Online.

learn djembe here – click

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