Navigation

You are here: Home › Congas

Instruments Archives: Congas

Funk

 

[wpspoiler name=”Get on the Night Train with James Brown in 1963″ open=”true” style=”aatw-video”][/wpspoiler]

Then came JAMES BROWN.

James Brown was an R&B crooner, a gospel preacher, the most soulful of soul artists, and, at the same moment, something completely new. Brown and his awesome, awesome band, THE JBs took the emphasis off of melody and harmony and put the focus on a driving, gutturally groovy, rhythm. In particular, unlike much soulful music of the time, Brown’s music emphasized “the downbeat,” or the first beat of a musical segment known as a measure. (Count 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4 and you’re counting out two measures of four beats each. Emphasize the first beat of each measure–1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4–and you’ll be in the ballpark of funk.) Brown’s band brought together many rhythmic instruments that had become standard in rock ‘n’ roll, like the electric guitar, electric bass, Hammond organ and a drum kit, and married them with a searing horn section. The band would then play songs that might consist, for the most part, of the same chord over and over. (This distinguished the form from R&B and soul songs which focds on more closely structured compositions.) “Godfather of Soul” Brown would use this repeated chord as a foundation upon which he’d sculpt the development of the performance, manipulating the pace of the band and the enthusiasm of the audience in order to whip everyone who was there into a frenzy.

In the ’70s in America funk formed the foundation for a less politically stirring form of music called disco, which we’ll explore in another week. It also inspired the even more intensely political Nigerian musician, FELA KUTI, to blend it with African rhythms to originate a genre called Afrobeat. [Watch Fela perform “Teacher Don’t Teach Me Nonsense” live in the UK in 1984. Note the funky James Brown-style guitar underneath.]

Today you’ll hear funk music many places–usually places where people dance. DJs at dance clubs regularly use funk records to get people grooving, hip hop artists regularly sample funk chords and progressions, and funk bands…well, they just do their darndest to stay funky.

[Watch James Brown tear it up with “Night Train” in 1963, Live at the Apollo, “Super Bad”
(which we’re going to hear in class) performed on Soul Train in 1970 and “Get on the Good Foot,” another Soul Train appearance, this time in 1973 | Watch SLY & THE FAMILY STONE funk it up on Soul Train | Free your mind with PARLIAMENT/FUNKADELIC as they perform live in 1979]

Latin Jazz

In the 1950s and ’60s American dancehall bands, which had for decades mainly performed dances and compositions that originated in the U.S., began to actively communicate with Latin musicians and add Latin dances like the mambo, samba and cha-cha-cha to their repertoires. Bebop band leaders like Dizzy Gillespie also wove Latin elements into their music, and in turn American jazz began to appear all over Latin America, fusing with Latin rhythms to become “Latin Jazz.” Latin jazz was syncopated like American jazz but didn’t emphasize the same beats, giving the music a different feel. The form introduced Latin instruments into jazz bands such as congas and bongos (both Afro-Cuban), the claves, the timbales and even the cowbell.

Latin bandleaders like TITO PUENTE, ARTURO SANDOVAL and PAQUITO D’RIVERA became popular in the U.S. in this time, as did a new trend, one that blended Brazilian samba with jazz, called “bossa nova” (which, conveniently, literally translates as “new
trend.”) American saxophone player STAN GETZ performed with Brazilian bossa nova musicians such as ANTONIO CARLOS JOBIM and JOÃO GILBERTO and receives due credit for popularizing the style in the U.S.

[Watch Tito Puente (on timabales) perform live in Montreaux in 1980 | Watch saxophonist Paquito D’Rivera perform live in Bern 1992 | Watch Arturo Sandoval and his band play, “Mam Bop,” in 1998 | Watch saxophone player Stan Getz share bossa nova with California in 1983]

Guaracha (Cuba, Puerto Rico)

Guaracha is a form of music with bawdy lyrics originally meant to accompany dances that blended Spanish and African moves. The guaracha appeared first in Spain and became a staple of Cuban theater groups that toured Puerto Rico in the 1800s, which would play clever guaracha songs between acts of their performances to keep the audience entertained.

COUNTRY: Cuba, Puerto Rico (U.S.)
KEY INSTRUMENTS: Bass, Bongo, Congas, Cuatro, Guiro, Maracas, Piano, Tres, Trumpet

[mappress mapid=”16″ center=”-8, -60″ zoom=”3″]

How to sing with Jay each week in your home or classroom Support All Around This World on Patreon Enjoy interactive All Around This World lessons in your home or classroom

Salsa (U.S., Puerto Rico, Cuba)

Salsa is Puerto Rico’s most danceable musical export. The musical progeny of Cuban son from which it borrows its signature 3-2 and 2-3 clave patterns, the genre may have started in Cuba and Puerto Rico but really took root in the ’60s and ’70s in New York City where Puerto Rican immigrants fused son, mambo and little guaracha to make an extraordinary new musical form. Stars like Frankie Ruiz, Willie Colon, and Panamanian superstar Rubén Blades brought the music to the U.S., to Latin America, and by the mid ’70s to the world. Salsa bands are usually ambitions affairs, featuring many percussion instruments and horns, though the basic stripped-down ensemble consists of just claves, güiro, timbale, cowbell and congas. If you want to build your own rhythm, take a look at Stephen’s salsa page or the Salsa Beat Machine where you’ll be able to turn on and off the instruments as if you were leading your own big band. Speaking of which, see Colon and Blades together make a powerful duo on “Tiburon.”

COUNTRY: United States, Puerto Rico (U.S.), Cuba
KEY INSTRUMENTS: Bass, Bongo, Claves, Congas, Cowbell, Guiro, Maracas, Saxophone, Timbales, Trombone, Trumpet
SONG ON AATW: LATIN AMERICA CD: Un Barco Chiquitito (Cuban salsa)

 

How to sing with Jay each week in your home or classroom Support All Around This World on Patreon Enjoy interactive All Around This World lessons in your home or classroom

Cuban Rumba

 

[wpspoiler name=”Meet Afro-Cuban Rumba” open=”true” style=”aatw-video”][/wpspoiler]

COUNTRY: Cuba

About the Cuban Rumba:

http://www.bailasociety.tv/public/439.cfm

Rumba:
Rumba — not to be confused with “rhumba,” which was a term that Americans used to describe Cuban music in the ’30s — began in the mid-1800s as a form of gathering and dance music performed by African-descended laborers.  According to Latin Music USA, “Rumba was originally performed on everyday objects to avoid the ban on African instruments.  A wine barrel was played like a drum, a wooden crate was tapped on with spoons, and the shipyard’s hardwood dowels were struck together (and became an instrument: claves).”  About the rumba | Learn the 3-2 rumba claves | Learn the 2-3 rumba claves | Rumba Yambu on YouTube

Timba

 

[wpspoiler name=”Los Van Van perform Temba, Tumba, Timba” open=”true” style=”aatw-video”][/wpspoiler]

TIMBA is upbeat dance music that developed in the 1990s as a synthesis of Cuban jazz, rock, rumba, disco and funk. It’s a”street level” form whose lyrics focus on urban issues among Cuban youth. TIMBA has a similar tempo and rhythm to salsa and uses many of the same instruments, but the instruments are used somewhat differently. For example, so says Wikipedia’s entry on timba, “Salsa bassists have standardized on bombo-ponche bass tumbao. This is sometimes used in TIMBA, but much more often a clave-aligned tumbao is used, and it is often specific to the song in question, while the bombo-ponche tumbaos of salsa, by definition, always use the same rhythm from song to song. Most importantly, TIMBA bassists stop and start their tumbaos, one of the defining aspects of timba gears. In salsa, the bass tumbao is omnipresent.” Couldn’t be clearer! Seriously, while salsa bands rarely have a drum kit with a kick drum, in timba a drum kit is essential, or at least a timbale player adds a kick drum, which s/he plays while standing. Also, TIMBA is known for “crossing the clave,” meaning that some of the instruments may be playing the 3-2 clave while others will simultaneously be playing the 2-3 (look above for an overview of clave). Scandalous. Listen to La Timba Loca for an example.

Mambo

COUNTRY: Cuba, Mexico, United States

Mambo:
In the 1930s, Cuban big band musicians added some elements of son to danzón to form an up-tempo dance music called MAMBO. The mambo is based on the 3-2 clave and uses a 4/4 beat (look above and at the Everything is a Drum rhythmic overview for a hint about what this means), with a dancer counting “quick quick slow,” moving his/her feet on the second beat of the four beat phrase, shifting weight to the other foot on the third, and returning to the original foot on the fourth. In other words, “1-2-3, 5-6-7.” MAMBO became most popular not in Cuba, but in Cuban refugee communities in New York and Mexico City. About the MAMBO | In Havana, dancing the MAMBO

Cuban Bolero (Cuba)

Cuban bolero–not to be confused with the Spanish music of the same name–originated in the 19th century as lyrical romantic music, performed on two Mexican-style guitars to Haitian rhythms. About the Cuban bolero | bolero on the front porch stoop in Santiago de Cuba

COUNTRY: Cuba
KEY INSTRUMENTS: Guitar, Claves, Congas, Maracas, Piano
SONG ON AATW: LATIN AMERICA CD: Azulão

[mappress mapid=”16″ center=”-8, -60″ zoom=”3″]

How to sing with Jay each week in your home or classroom Support All Around This World on Patreon Enjoy interactive All Around This World lessons in your home or classroom

Congolese Rumba

[Information about Congolese rumba coming soon.]

How to sing with Jay each week in your home or classroom Support All Around This World on Patreon Enjoy interactive All Around This World lessons in your home or classroom

Older posts