Types of Hand Drums

Hello!!! Welcome back to our blog. We will be talking about the same topic about Hand drums. I hope that you have read our previous articles about the importance of drums for the Africans. In this article, I am striving to give you some important information about the hand drum. As you know that drums are the oldest and simplest musical instruments in the world, so I guess that many of us are interested in it. So, I then decide to write this topic and share it with you. This article of mine is basically about the information that read on the internet the following are the famous hand drums which have been well-known to the worldwide.

1. Ashiko

The ashiko drum is one of the most used African drums in the world. Actually, Ashiko is very similar to Djembe. This instrument is a hand drum that is shaped like a cut-off cone which can produce three tones. As of now, we still doubt and do not know exactly where the original place of Ashiko drum is. Many people guess that it is ranging from Ghana to Nigeria. Generally, the ashiko drum heads have the fur still on the animal skin, which muffles the sound.

2. Conga

The conga drum is a tall, barrel and single-headed drum which has a djembe-like shaped standing drum. This conga is generally played by beating with our hands. Until today, this musical instrument has been very popular in different parts of the world especially in America.

3. Djembe

Djembe is considered to be the most popular African hand drums. The use of djembe now has been worldwide. In almost every country, we can find this type of instrument. The djembe is a goblet-shaped hand drum. This Djembe is originally coming from the country of Mali. Djembe is traditionally made out of a well-carved African wood and animal skin. The carved wood is used as its body and the skin is for the head. It is quite simple to play this instrument. It is played by beating the membrane using our hands. This instrument is also very popular in Indonesia, especially in Bali. We also can see that today’s musicians like to collaborate this djembe with other musical instruments such guitar, organ and drums.

4. Djun-djun

This instrument is very unique because it has a two-headed bass drum. The two-headed bass drum or the so-called Djun-djun is originated in western Africa. This African drum instrument is commonly played together with other drum sets such as djembe and congas.

5. Doumbek

Doumbek is also well-known as Darbuka. This African instrument is originally coming from Egypt. The Egyptian Darbuka style has rounded edges around the head of the drum. This instrument is quite popular in Africa and also in the Middle East.

6. Cajon

        Cajon drum is the most popular American musical instruments in the world. This instrument is said to be originated from the country of Peru. In the old times, the Peruvian slaves were not allowed to play any musical instruments music more their traditional instrument. It was strictly prohibited by the Spaniards. Peruvian slaves then decided to create a box-shaped instrument which was made out of unused wood. They moulded it in such a way that appeared to be a sit. That was hoe the tricked the Spaniards. In order to play this African Cajon drums, you need to sit on the top of the instrument and then beating the front side of the Cajon using your hands.