Balafon

[Nodrog]

Hi there,

It's pretty obvious after viewing most of these videos of balafola on this site and also loads more on youtube that there seems to be no right or wrong way around to play the bala or gyil. Some have the bass to the left,others to the right.

I'm guessing that this is because sometimes these instruments are played from both sides at the same time. I'm wondering if a seasoned balafola changes sometimes or do they generally stick to one way?

It's hard to imagine for example a piano with the bass starting on the right side with the higher notes down on the left.

Maybe it's more like a guitar player who prefers a left handed guitar style as in Paul McCartney for example.

Would be interesting to know. I would imagine for us Europeans and Americans, most of us would automatically want the bass side to the left just because we are used to seeing a piano keyboard set out that way.

All the best, Gordon.

[Paul]

Kamelle ngonis are stringed left to right in mali and the opposite in Burkina. So a mali player having a go on a burkina ngoni plays it upside down..

[BobF]

My understanding is it's a personal preferance thing. I've noticed a lot of people play the opposite of their teacher (makes it easier to sit across and mimic hand movements). I asked my teacher when I first got my bala and he said to pick whichever way I wanted. I chose bass on my left simply because I grew up playing piano and it made sense to go to my right to go higher.

[tekrtu]

When I got my first bala last spring, I didn´t even think about starting to learn it other way than playing bassbnotes with my left hand and higher ones with right hand. This way of playing felt so natural for me. As I have understood, it would be very usefull to be able to play on both sides, because sometimes two player play one bala on opposite sides like in this video.

http://www.youtube.com/user/SAMBLADIABA ... lW3rTJ0gO0


Well, I am not so strict with this at this point of my personal journey to a world of bala.

[Nodrog]

Hi there,

Ok, My bala which I ordered from Bara Gnouma just arrived yesterday. I would like to thank Paul who contributes on this forum and also Fabrice who works with Bara Gnouma and he is the guy who I placed my order with. I had it custom made in the diatonic Gmaj. It has 22 keys which means three complete 7 note octaves starting and ending with a G.

I chose this scale and key because this was best suited to fit in with my African guitar recording projects I am playing around with. I like G and Em on the guitar, course ,if I want different chord positions I can use the good old capo.

It is a beautiful and wonderful sounding instrument complete with the buzzing effect from the calabash underneath. I must say, my main concern was how accurate the tuning would be. Well, it's absolutely spot on, no problems. It was a little damaged when I unpacked it. The curved end brace was broken in transport but out came the wood glue and I let it sit overnight with a couple of clamps squeezing it together and it seems fine now. Also, it came complete with four hammers, great stuff.

That would be my only recommendation to Bara Gnouma. When packing and transporting a fragile instrument like this, it does need plenty of padding in the box. In this case , there was none at all.

Anyway, it all ends well and I just need to learn how to play it now. I will post some recorded examples once we get to know each other.

Thanks again Paul and Fabrice.

Gordon.

[Paul]

My pleasure mate.

[Nodrog]

Hi there,

A quick update on my learning the bala. Well, so far it's a slow process because I'm mainly putting my spare time into my recording projects and how to get the best out of my Boss recorder.

After saying that, as with the djembe, I'm not tied to playing everything in a traditional way, I see both the drum and the bala as a blank slate and the challenge for me is to get to know them and make them sound good. At this stage, I am just making my own music so it is not necessary for me to learn strict beats and rhythms which if I was part of a drum ensemble also maybe with dancers involved it would be a lot different. I might do some parts that lean towards the traditional techniques but probably, most of the time, not so traditional. Most of the time I wouldn't know the difference anyway..ha, ha.

Because I play a lot of reggae influenced music, I am working on a method of playing with three mallets. One in the left hand for playing the bass and two in the right hand which can either play a melody line or more often two note chords, usually thirds.

Before the bala arrived, I had been practicing bala type tunes on my keyboard set up with a marimba sound. The main hurdle to cross was the difference in spacing of the keys. Obviously, on a piano or keyboard the notes are a lot closer together so it is a lot easier to scan with the eyes where the fingers need to be placed. All of a sudden, the bala arrives and that is the one thing that I'm finding tricky, the wider spacing of the keys. I am getting it though and my latest trainig exercise is a bala version of "Double Barrel", a classic reggae tune by Dave and Ansil Collins I believe.

When I get a little more confident I will make a few recordings and post them on here somewhere. I have used it already on some of my songs but just as a background effect and not yet the star roll. I will get it eventually...

All the best, Gordon.

[tekrtu]

I took my first balafon lessons with a teacher last sunday starting with Orodora Sidiki's basic accompaniment with few variations. He taught me traditional way to play Orodora, wich is very impressive style. There is some difference between traditional style and Adama Diabate's style in Baragnouma's tutorial clip, but for me both ways are very nice. However, it's important to know what is traditional way and what is musician's own variation, own style.

During my lesson I found out how important it is to have real teacher, who comes from that culture, who is professional with djoula balafon and who has very deep knowledge of his own musical tradition. Of course at first it has been good to come familiar with balafon by reading tutorial books, like La Voix Du Balafon, but the problem is that rhytms hasn't necessarily been shown as traditional way, but easier way for beginners.

Sure I could play balafon as my own style, but I am trying to reach african way of playing, trying to reach that special feeling of music, wich is part of its beauty.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjmXAoVQqTw

[malinke]

visit http://mamadoudiabate.com/DldExercises.html

[Dugafola]

the revised edition of the mandinka balafon by lynn jessup is now available for purchase, $45. it comes with 2 cds and is available from dandemutande and percussionmusic.

does anyone have this book/cd?
it's now $58 with more photos and gloss and prettyness...

[bubudi]

i've seen extracts of it. you may find learning to play a two-handed accompaniment from western musical notation pretty hard going. an alternative would be the dvd instructional by naby camara.

another source of notation if you want to go that way is this free disertation on the bala, with various transcriptions for 5 different pieces of the mandinka repertoire. right click the link above and save to your computer.

[Michel]

Hi all,

in this thread Gert Kilian was allready mentioned, with his book balafon beat. In 2009 together with the great Bamana-balafola Aly Keita he made a as he calls it 'initiation method' for the Bamana-bala. It is a teaching method that gave me a lot of inspiration to play my pentatonic bala. It is a book with a lot of information about the background and the making of the bala, it also tells about balafons from other African countries. It also has the musical notation of pieces that you can learn from a very clear play-along dvd. On 5 pieces they (gert Kilian and aly Keita) play the right hand/left hand rhythm apart, then the both together, and some solo's. There is an extra dvd with the balafon-documentary 'heaven between the slats'. It's in English and French, and has German subtitles. It's worth to have a look on le-salon-de-musique.com

Michel

[bubudi]

It's worth to have a look on le-salon-de-musique.com

or you can go directly to the author's site.

[bubudi]

[James]

Sory lives near Lyon in France and will be playing in Nice soon. He is also going to be at the Mama Africa festival this year.