Here are some great tips to try out the next time you are under the spotlight with just your darbuka!
The Darbuka solo! For many this is the fun part to just let loose and go wild, but for others its a hurdle if not a dead end road. Many players get blocked and can’t really think of anything to play at all. The thought of improvising is really just way too difficult….or is it!
I have recently come across many students that are having a hard time with soloing and improvising. Thats just normal in the beginning for most darbuka players but how do we overcome the hurdle?
Some simple ideas and exercises should help to get you over the stumbling block.
Lets just change the way we all look at the darbuka solo for a moment. What is a darbuka solo exactly? Is it a chance to play as fast as one can to impress the audience with dazzling technique? Is it to give a belly dancer something to move to? Is it to express yourself and let all your emotion out through the darbuka? Or is it just a simple conversation between a few musicians? It could be one or all of the above depending on the situation and reasons that you play music.
For me personally, most of the time it is an emotional release of some sort. It’s about being lost in time (or just absolutely present) and playing something in that moment that reflects how i am feeling.
Easier said than done you may be thinking? Well, in this case it comes down to having a vocabulary to draw from. Think back to the last time you had a really deep conversation with a friend. How many words did you use to describe what it was you were talking about? You had to have a vocabulary! When we are learning a new language we get to a frustrating point of not being able to express ourselves properly becouse of our limitation with words. This is where many of you may be with your darbuka soloing.
Perhaps taking the time to learn new tones and techniques on the darbuka will open up some doors for your playing. Get yourself a vocabulary!
Once we have all the tones (words) that we need to express ourselves on the darbuka we need to learn how to improvise. Yes, we could learn other people solo’s and ideas to get us started but sooner or later we need to create some originality in our playing.
Stay tuned for the second part of this article…
Matt Fingers of Fury Darbuka community
Tags: Darbuka
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