bangourake, sibo & momae playing dunungbe

[michi]

I learned Disco from Malin Sylla in 2004. Here is the main djembe part for Disco:

Code: Select all

1...2...3...4...
b..b..s.b..bt.S.


The "S" represents a slap-flam.

Djembe 2 is:

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1...2...3...4...
ttttb.b.ttttb.b.


Here is what it sounds like (Percussion Studio):

DiscoDjembe.mp3

Disco - Djembe 1 & 2

(532.2 KiB) Downloaded 56 times

The ballet dunduns Malin taught are:

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1...2...3...4...5...6...7...8...
d.kd.kd.d...d.d.dd.d..k.k.k.k...


DiscoDundun.mp3

Disco - Ballet dunduns

(476.65 KiB) Downloaded 54 times

Malin had the sangban playing this:

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1...2...3...4...
oo..oo..oo..oo..
x.x.x.x.x.x.x.x.


He also taught a very simple intro. (This was for beginner's class, so that's almost certainly not an intro he would play in a performance situation. I suspect he tuned it down so the people there could actually play it.) Here is the ensemble with intro:

DiscoEnsemble.mp3

Disco - Ensemble

(672.89 KiB) Downloaded 54 times

BTW the way, "Staying Alive" is the proper song to sing alongside this groove

Cheers,

Michi.

[bubudi]

dugs, first track on fote foret is disco.

malin's the only person i've seen teach disco. it has a groove a little like kuku. in 2005 he showed it a little different than what michi posted. from memory this is the ballet dunun pattern he showed:

Code: Select all

d.kd.kd.d...d.d.dd.d....k.k.kk..

this was the first djembe part he showed:

Code: Select all

s.tt..s.s.tt..s.

[Dugafola]

dugs, first track on fote foret is disco.

i know...as i said above:

the only disco i know of is recorded by tonton sylla as a djembe kan. i didn't know Bangourake teaches "Disco". awesome. do you have a recording or can you post notation?

i nominate Disco for the rhythm of the month.

[michi]

malin's the only person i've seen teach disco. it has a groove a little like kuku. in 2005 he showed it a little different than what michi posted. from memory this is the ballet dunun pattern he showed:

Code: Select all

d.kd.kd.d...d.d.dd.d....k.k.kk..

Very similar, but not the same.

this was the first djembe part he showed:

Code: Select all

s.tt..s.s.tt..s.

Definitely no mention of that accompaniment when he taught it in Brisbane, around Sep or Oct 2004. The transcript I posted is definitely accurate—I transcribed from a recording I made at Malin's workshop.

But, for modern made-up rhythm, I'm not surprised to see major variations because people are still figuring out what works best with this particular groove, so they experiment.

By the way, while I've never seen Bangourake teach Disco, I came across it in Feb 2008 in Ghana. Just after I had arrived, my Ghanaian teachers started playing Disco and, when I fell in, were all surprised: "you know this?!" I suspect that someone had learned it in Australia, taken it to Ghana and, by the time I was there, the Ghanaian teachers were teaching it to their students (who were mostly from Australia anyway). It's like Richard Dawkins's Memes: invent a rhythm and it acquires this viral-like quality, taken on a life of its own…

Cheers,

Michi.

[James]

Disco will never die!

Hit the lights!