[ternarizator]

Hi djembefolaw

I'm Vincent, from France, 47 years old.

My job is mathematics teacher, but I have been interested in music since 1972.

I studied music theory for more than 11 years and trumpet for 10 years.

After a while playing in local bands, I discovered northwest-african rhythms and instruments like darbuka, tbila, bendir, guellal, and also microtiming through practicing gnawa's qarqabs, since 1988.

I then have been studying mande music since 1994. With a few friends, we play in a djembé-dununs orchestra since 1996. We also play music for a class of african dance every thursday since 1997. I'm the soloist (not a very good in my opinion, but it works...)

As a follower of the scientific approach, I can't help but look for the why and how of everything, so I have developped some hypothesis about ternarization (from quaternary to ternary in particular), microtiming, mande rhythm families, technical birth of clave-patterns and related bell-patterns, building of djembé accompaniments from complete patterns (like bbttbbss for example) etc...

In my band, we play traditional rhythms, but also modified ones (mostly by ternarization or "unternarization", but also by changing one part to enrich the melorhythm....)

One of my goals in participating in this forum is to share my ideas about mande music and receive opinions of other djembefolaw about them, in order to refine (or even refute) my approach.

So far, it has been a pleasure to read and share in this forum, I hope it will continue for a long time!..

Vincent.

[michi]

You and Jürgen should get on just famously

Welcome to the forum!

Michi.

[djembefeeling]

Yes Vincent, welcome to the forum!

I am looking forward to your informed opinions and hope I can keep up to them...

jürgen

p.s. nice to have more french guys on the forum. you are so deep into the djembe in France, when hearsay doesn't deceive me. So many good guys from West Africa, too.

[ternarizator]

Hello again !

Michi's intervention reminds me that I forgot some things in my introduction : like many of you I guess, I have been a djembe/dununs teacher (between 1994 and 2010, but I would probably start again one day) and I'm also a djembe repairer, so Michi we are sort of "colleagues" ! (but I didn't write any books on the subject...).

And from time to time, I'm also interested in didgeridoo and Tuvan overtone singing : I think I like psychomotor challenges...

Nice to read you

Vincent.

[michi]

like many of you I guess, I have been a djembe/dununs teacher (between 1994 and 2010, but I would probably start again one day) and I'm also a djembe repairer, so Michi we are sort of "colleagues" !

I would expect many teachers to also be drum makers. I guess it comes naturally. To be good enough to teach implies that I'm probably playing a lot and that I likely have more than one drum, meaning that skins need replacing more often. From there, it's only a small step towards learning how to do it myself, if only not to have to wait for someone else to finally find the time to fix the drum I've been waiting for for weeks…

And then, every now and then, students rock up with a broken drum and ask "where can I get this fixed?" Well if I can fix my own drums, I can fix my student's drums, and that's that.

This is pretty much how it happened for me, and I expect it'll be similar for other teachers. In a way we are lucky: a djembe is a simple-enough instrument to do one's own maintenance. Not so with something like a saxophone or a piano…

(but I didn't write any books on the subject...).

Only truly obsessive people with plenty of time on their hands do

Michi.

[davidognomo]

Hey, Vincent. I'm curious about that band you talked about and the work you do. Do you have a link where we could check it out?

[ternarizator]

I would expect many teachers to also be drum makers. I guess it comes naturally. To be good enough to teach implies that I'm probably playing a lot and that I likely have more than one drum, meaning that skins need replacing more often. From there, it's only a small step towards learning how to do it myself, if only not to have to wait for someone else to finally find the time to fix the drum I've been waiting for for weeks…

And then, every now and then, students rock up with a broken drum and ask "where can I get this fixed?" Well if I can fix my own drums, I can fix my student's drums, and that's that.

This is pretty much how it happened for me, and I expect it'll be similar for other teachers. In a way we are lucky: a djembe is a simple-enough instrument to do one's own maintenance. Not so with something like a saxophone or a piano…

You're right Michi, it seems perfectly logical !

As for me, I did everything backwards : first I had no djembé and no money, so I started to build drums in pvc pipe or flowerpots, with rabbitskin, sheepskin and even roeskin (no kangaroo around... ). Then I started to remount skins for some friends. The deal was : once the djembé repaired, I could keep it a few weeks to practice on a proper instrument. Each time, I took the dimensions of it, in order to get an idea of what could be my ideal djembé in the future. Later, someone gave me a crooked and cracked djembe (wow it sounds ! Hope it's good english ) and it was up to me to learn how to improve the shell... Meanwhile I started to teach. This is my story...

Hey, Vincent. I'm curious about that band you talked about and the work you do. Do you have a link where we could check it out?

I think it's not a good idea, cause I have really no recent video of the band, and this is not at all a professional level, due to the heterogeneity of the group [so I know what I have to do to get out of this embarrassing situation : work hard and post a good video on Youtube, thanks a lot David ! ].
About my theoretical work, I'm the guy who gave the 3½ notation to Paul Nas for soboninkun http://www.paulnas.eu/wap/sobonincun.html. That said, I'd rather tend to 3 1/3 now, which corresponds to the 40/30/30 microtiming, because 3½ sounds too much like 4 (quaternary) than like 3 (ternary). Don't know if it's clear...

Vincent.