With apologies for the late lack of posting, here is a little bit of a retread/refinement of my earlier Page of Mozambique. I’ve been working with this feel quite a bit, but have struggled to […]
Category: salsa
Daily best music in the world: Mozambique
Melao Para El Sapo, a New York-style Mozambique by Eddie Palmieri. I’m finding that my page of Mozambique from 2013 is holding up pretty well as a method for getting some basic fluency with this […]
Generic Latin method for Syncopation: part 1
Here’s a basic method for doing a generic, Afro-Cuban-derived Latin feel using the book Syncopation. We’ll be taking rhythmic patterns out of Reed, and using them as our bell pattern, playing them with the right […]
Son clave basic coordination
Here’s a companion piece to our page of Rumba clave coordination, this time using Son clave. The format is basically same: the first patterns are logical, and the later ones build a few common Afro-Cuban […]
More Guaguancó
OK, my new record is done, my taxes are done, and it’s time to get back to business as usual. Here I’ve found here an interesting version of Guaguanco, a very popular traditional Afro-Cuban rumba […]
Lighting round: four new books
New to me, anyway— I think these have all been around awhile. I thought I’d give my rapid-fire opinion on some things I just got in the mail: Daily Drumset Workout by Claus Hessler We’ll […]
The Abanico
The Abanico (meaning “fan” in Spanish) is the name of a stock set-up that occurs in Salsa, Afro-Cuban music, whatever you choose to call it. It is played by the timbale player— the timbalero—to bring […]
Transcription: Raymond “Monchito” Muñoz — Caminando
Here we have a Latin percussionist funking out a little bit on Caminando, a hip cha cha* recorded by Eddie Palmieri on his great album Vamonos Pa’l Monte. The drummer, Raymond “Monchito” Muñoz, brings very […]
Page o’ coordination: 6/8 Rumba clave in the left hand
Like I said: a lotta 6/8. That feel has always been one of the stronger elements of my playing, but I thought I’d see what happens if I do a whole lot of more work […]
Snare studies for developing some Afro-Cuban bell patterns
There is so much heavy coordination involved in learning the Afro-Cuban styles that it’s easy to neglect simply getting the bell patterns right— which is a lot like playing jazz without spending any time working […]
Page of Guaguancó
Lately I’ve been whittling away at my ignorance of Afro-Cuban/Salsa drumming, and here we’ll look at Guaguancó (say wah-wahn-CO), or Rumba Guaguancó, a very distinctive and popular style I first became acquainted with via a […]
Page of Mozambique — UPDATED
I’ve been working with our earlier page of Mozambique quite a bit (yes, I do in fact practice the non-transcription stuff I post here), and thought it could use a bit of refining, so here […]