name the dununba

[bubudi]

i had an idea today...

someone posts a sangban recording and everyone has to name the dunun rhythm it defines. great for refreshing the memory and consolidating knowledge for those studying for the ttm cert or just for their knowledge.

what do you think?

[Djembe-nerd]

I think its great. may of yo will refresh your memory and some of us will learn new ones.

[Dugafola]

i love games.

[michi]

I think the idea is great. One problem I see though is that the first person to post a reply is likely to end the contest. I mean, if Duga says "This is Dunungbe", who's going to argue with him (except maybe you, Bubudi )

So, the replies should probably go to you, you collate them for a few days, and then post the answers (or, at least, the names of those who submitted a correct answer).

Cheers,

Michi.

[the kid]

yeah like some one post the sanban of menjani

[bubudi]

i guess i'll be expecting a lot of pm's then... we'll have to stop people posting the answer publicly and spoiling the fun. the karma mod would have been good for that

[michi]

the karma mod would have been good for that

Exactly how much oil is it that you want to pour on the flames?

Cheers,

Michi.

[bops]

I'll play. What's the buy-in?

Reminds me of the 'blindfold test' they do in jazz magazines. They would play obscure records for jazz musicians, who in turn had to name the musicians. I guess this is more like "name that tune", but the blindfold test would be fun, too.

[Carl]

I'm in!

I'm starting to mess with my band mates by changing the sangba part from one dununba to another mid-song... see who catches it! - pitty the poor dununba player.

It's a bit tough on Dan as he is just getting into dununbas. Yesterday I switched from Tama to Takisoba... made it through 2 cycles before everything fell apart (bad Carl! no biscut!)

C

[Dugafola]

I'm in!

I'm starting to mess with my band mates by changing the sangba part from one dununba to another mid-song... see who catches it! - pitty the poor dununba player.
C

that's the best part imo. being able to switch on the fly to follow a dancer or just if you're inspired to switch it up. it definitely helps to have a great rapport b/w sangfola and dunfola.

[Carl]

that's the best part imo. being able to switch on the fly to follow a dancer or just if you're inspired to switch it up. it definitely helps to have a great rapport b/w sangfola and dunfola.

Definitly, one of the guy's in the band can follow about 5 or 6 of the 10 or so that I know, when the two of us are on dununs craziness WILL happen!

Now I just need to find a dancer who does dununba! Alhassan Camara, who has been visiting for the last couple of weeks, said that he might be interested in moving into the area... I can only hope!

C

[Dugafola]

that's the best part imo. being able to switch on the fly to follow a dancer or just if you're inspired to switch it up. it definitely helps to have a great rapport b/w sangfola and dunfola.

Definitly, one of the guy's in the band can follow about 5 or 6 of the 10 or so that I know, when the two of us are on dununs craziness WILL happen!

Now I just need to find a dancer who does dununba! Alhassan Camara, who has been visiting for the last couple of weeks, said that he might be interested in moving into the area... I can only hope!

C

hijackage...out of all the guinean dancers i've seen in this country, there's only a handful that really know the dununba dance language. the rest of it is all ballet choreo with some chauffe moves. this is even more evident when you go to a dununba party in CKY. you'll have dancers doing steps from lamban, mendiani, koreduga...the whole 9 yards. then they'll end it with a chauffe move and a pelvic thrust.

that's why 90% of the time you can get away with playing konden in a dance class and it'll be fine. i used to get frustrated by not being able to rock some other dununbas in a dance class but in the end, that's what they used to dance dununba too in the ballet and that's what they want to hear.

[bubudi]

lamban steps in a dununba class? your mob really mash it up! or are you talking about the folk in conakry? here the guineans mostly keep it to just dununba steps. a little bit from every dunun rhythm. the drummers usually play dunungbe in dance class if we're going to do that. we've never had a taama class or a takosaba class, but we've incorporated a couple of 'breaks' where the dancers do steps from other dunun rhythms, like what they do in the ballets.

i think the reason it's done this way is that in the cities, not many people truly appreciate dununbas to the point where they pay attention to every dununba rhythm/dance. they don't grow up with all the dunun dances like in hamana, so unless they are hardcore djembe/dunun players, they won't appreciate the subtle variety - it's all dununba to them.

[Carl]

Saddly, without a lot more study on my part, I wouldn't know a correct or incorrect dununba dance if I saw one. Anyone know of a visual crash corse that I could take? list of youtube vids that you know are accurate (or at least reasonably so?)

I saw Mohamed Bangoura teach a dununba class sometime around 2001 or 2002. Way too long ago for me to remember much beyond some very basic moves.

Famoudou demonstrated some stuff last year, but again it was pretty basic, and since he was dancing, there was no solo/dance step matching.

So much to learn, so little time!

C