When people first come along to a gathering of the Worldwise Samba Drummers, one of the first decisions they have to make is what instrument to try out. In this blog, I will briefly describe each of the instruments used by the Worldwise Samba Drummers.
The tamborim/tambourim is the smallest of the drums and often has the longest patterns to learn. Different types of beaters are used for the tamborim but Worldwise Samba Drummers use multi-pronged plastic sticks. For some of our pieces the tamborim section instead play agogos - two-pronged bells, also quite small in size, that produce sounds at two different pitches. The tamborims and agogos are like the melody instruments of the samba band.
At the other extreme, the surdos are the largest drums in the band and are played with soft-headed beaters. Most samba bands have three surdo sections. We call our surdo sections the ones, twos and threes; some bands will instead use the terms primera/marcacao, segunda/reposta and terceira/cutador/cortador. The ones and twos are the lowest drums and often play alternately on the beat meaning that, whilst they are the most unwieldy instruments to carry, they have the easiest pattern to learn. The threes will usually have more complicated rhythms. The surdos give the samba band its thunderous power.
The caixa is a type of snare drum and is played with a pair of wooden drumsticks. The caixa patterns usually involve the drummer alternating between right and left hand with some notes played quietly - the ghost notes - and some played more loudly - the accents. The caixa is the instrument whose initial techniques are the most difficult to learn and so, in the Worldwise Samba Drummers, we recommend that only people with prior drumming or some samba drumming experience take on the caixa as their first samba instrument. The caixa section gives the samba band its energy.
The timba (also known as timbau or timbal) is a hand drum similar to a djembe or conga. Hitting the drum head in different places and with different hand shapes makes different sounds. Most of our samba patterns use what are known as bass and slap notes; some also use tones. Even more than the other instruments, it is important to play the timba correctly to avoid hurting your wrists. The timba section helps give each piece its different flavour.
The chocalho is a shaker that is used to add fizz to the overall sound of the band. Although it can be used to create complicated rhythms, we usually stick to two different patterns played at different speeds but don’t think that this makes it easy - playing the chocalho properly takes lots of energy and stamina as some of our drummers will tell you!
Later blog posts will go into more detail about the different instruments but hopefully this will give you some understanding of the instruments available. For those of you who aren’t already in a samba band, what instrument would you want to play?
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