Songo is one of the few Afro-Cuban rhythms created specifically for the drum kit. The Cuban percussionist Changuito (José Luis Quintana) developed the songo while playing in Los Van Van in the ’70s. These patterns have their roots in timbale patterns and there are many variations. For the purposes of this lesson, we will simply focus on one.
The first thing to identify when playing Afro-Cuban music is the clave pattern. The clave pattern is literally the rhythmic ‘key’ to the music. Songo is usually played in 2-3 rumba clave, with two beats in the first bar and three beats in the second. ‘Rumba’ indicates that the third beat of the ‘3’ side of the clave is displaced to the ‘&’ of beat four.
This creates a more syncopated effect.
Listen to the melody and rhythm to hear where the clave pattern falls. The clave is here for reference, you don’t need to play it.......
Examples and further information are in Issue 296 (March 2020) of Rhythm Magazine.
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