New Skin Ringiness Help~~

[zackaa05]

Hello Friends~~

I know there have been several threads regarding excess ring, but I was hoping to get some individual help to my situation... I play a Lenge djembe from Burkina Faso which was reheaded just over 6 months ago. When the new head was put on, the builder told me that the bearing edge was super sharp, and that they would round it out a bit for me.

They put the new skin on and I tightened it up about half a row further, till the distinction between bass/tone/slap was clear. Even at this point, there was a strong ring/overtone on the tone and slap. I figured it was probably technique at the time. I went away for several months, and tuned it down before I left, and have just returned to the drum. I have been practicing a ton since then and my technique is much improved, but the ringing is still there.

The drum now has a little more than half a row and feels very tight, and I've been adding a few knots here and there to try and get rid of the excess ringing. The knots are still very easy to pull as the first row is very low on my drum.

My question is -- as the skin is only 6 months old, do you think I just should keep pulling diamonds until I really can't anymore and see if the ring settles, or just accept the situation? Of course my fear is having the head pop... there are about 12 diamonds left until the first row is finished -- I would guess that the tension isnt balanced but the drum is in tune with itself all the way around the drum.

Anyway, I'm looking for advice, and would be thankful for any input. When I place a fingertip or two at the very very edge of the playing surface and play the tones with the other hand, I get pure sounds without the ringing....


Thanks for your time and help!
Z

[bubudi]

here's my advice. at some point your skin is going to pop, and if you're playing it a ton like you say, that time is going to be sometime soon. get used to the fact. crank it up! then crank it some more! you've only made half a row of mali weave. i've seen lots of drums with 3 rows. to have a drum sound good after 6 months with only half a row you would have had to pull the verticals almost to breaking point to begin with. at this stage the difficulty of pulling the mali weave depends more on how tight your verticals are than anything else. also consider that your drum is bound to have detuned a lot in the past 6 months due to absorbing humidity from the air and if it has african rope on it, that would have stretched a bit too. without hearing your drum i can't tell how high you've pulled it or if the ring is excessive. you could record a short mp3 of yourself playing a few tones and slaps and attach it to your reply. that would give us more of an idea.

[zackaa05]

Thanks for the reply and advice, I appreciate your time!

I think I'll crank crank crank it up and see what happens along the way. If I add a significant amount of diamonds and the ringing persists I'll record a quick MP3 for review -- thanks again, and I'll let you know what happens.

Best,
Z

[bops]

I agree with everything bubudi said.

Of course my fear is having the head pop...

Are you familiar with the Mandala? Nothing in life is permanent, my friend. Crank crank crank it up, and enjoy!

[Trog]

This is a old thread, but I have had a similar experience with a Djembe I had custom made. The drum had bad ringing (not sustain). My Djembe is a 13 1/2X24" Lenke wood from Guinea with a medium goat skin.
The 1st thing I tried was to tighten gradually and play it for over a month.
Next I tried undoing the mali weave and pulled the verticals again then reweaved. This helped some.
The skin had some bug bites in it and I used superglue to fill and then sanded flat. This had nothing to do with the ringing.
Next, I tried sanding the skin (used 320 grit). Since at this point I figured if it popped, I would not be losing much. I didn't have to sand all the color out of the skin before the ringing went away and now the drum has beautiful sound.
Thanks to the input from the people on this forum, I now have a drum I'm happy to play.

[Djembe-nerd]

Reason 1 : if the djembe is not tuned tight enough it will also always give you ringing, so tighten it. If the ringing does not lessen, see reason 2

Reason 2: From what you say, this skin is not broken yet,Tight it and play for a month, then losen all the diamonds and pull back to the same tightness again, it should go away.

Slap/tone/bass distinction is not the measure for a correct tuning, this distinction can come even when the tension is not sufficent.

Record a Mp3, the forum could probably help you with a better advice after listening