African Drums Ringtone

Download to your phone using WAP Go to wap.mytinyphone.com (without www.) on your cell phone, type in a897901 (code number of this ringtone) into 'code nr' box, to get it on your phone for free. Your carrier might charge you for internet access.

Military music is a mix of strong defense and legendary offense, marches, and epic patriotic tunes. 231 melodies for commercial use & download royalty free Military background music MP3 WAV.
Nigerian-born songwriter and music producer, Ikwano, explains how his winning ringtone called Simply African was created: “I drew my musical influences from across Africa. With very few exceptions from the North, music of African origin tends to be rhythmically rich and features more percussive elements than melodic elements.”.
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Traditionally, the drum was the heartbeat, thesoul of most African communities. Drums have been an intrinsic part of Africanlife for centuries and for countless generations, an ancient instrument used tocelebrate all the aspects of life.

In Western culture drumming is, most often,about entertainment. In Africa, drums hold a deeper, symbolic and historicalsignificance. They herald political and social events attending ceremonies ofbirth, death and marriage. They spark courtships, they herald home-coming andgoing and they accompany religious rites and rituals, calling up ancestralspirits.

They are used as an alarm or a call to arms stirringup emotions for battle and war. They can also inspire passion and excitementand even cause trances, a momentary loss of consciousness to either the drummeror the listener. They symbolize and protect royalty and areoften housed in sacred dwellings. They are protected during battle.

On the other side, drums are aboutcommunication and making music, two essential characteristics of communitylife. For centuries the ‘talking drums’ were a primary source of communicationbetween tribes used to transmit messages sometimes across great distances.

African music is a total art form closely integrated with dance, gesture and dramatization. Drums are the music instrument that African music relies heavily upon to create the fast-paced, upbeat, rhythmic beat that signifies most African music.

The drums can be both musical instruments and works of art, sculptural forms that are often decorated in a resplendent manner suited to their ceremonial function. They can also be everyday objects with simple but monumental form.

Technically most drums are described as 'membranophones” and consist of a skin or drumhead stretched over the open endof a frame or ‘shell’. The shell is, most often, constructed from wood.

The sound is generated by striking the drumheadwith hands, a stick, a rubber mallet or even the bones of the deceased. Thesurface can also be rubbed to create soft swishing sounds. Sometimes the drums can have rattling metal jingles attached to the outside or seeds and beads placed inside to create extra kinds of noises.

They can be made from wood, metal, earthenwareor gourds.

Their form can be tubular, hourglass, circular or bowl, kettle, gobletor barrel shaped. They can be round, square, hexagonal, octagonal or placedwithin a frame.

‘Open drums’ are single-headed with an opening at one end and ‘closed drums’ are single or double-headed with no open end.

In size they can be tall or diminutive like thetom tom. In general, the bigger thedrum the lower the note and the moretension in the head, the higher the note. Wide drums add the bass sounds.

Shangaan drummers, Zimbabwe

They can have handles or straps and be held under the armpits. They can be rested on a wooden support and they can have feet or pedestals standing on their own, being carried on backs or held between or on the knees. They can be played singly, or in pairs, or be part of a large group drum ensemble with graded tones and pitches. ‘Drum chimes’ are mounted in a frame, tuned to a scale and played by a team.

Drumsticks vary from being heavy cudgels for sounding the ngoma to slender beaters tipped with rubber to elegantly curved thin sticks.

“Idiophones” refer to the Udu, log or slitdrums which create sound not by beating or rubbing but by the instrument vibratinghaving been struck, shaken or scraped.

The membrane of the drum is most often constructed from the skin of an antelope, goat, sheep or cow and less frequently from zebra, wildebeest or reptiles like crocodiles and monitor lizards. The skin is dried out in the sun and the hair shaved. It is then stretched over the hollowed out, preferably hardwood, drum base.

The skin is tightened with leather straps and nailed or pegged on. Resin on the membrane will control tone and a good drummer will treat the surface with beeswax before a performance, holding the drumhead over an open fire to stretch the skin.

Buganda, Uganda Royal fetish drum from a set of tuned drums or drum chime ca 1910

Twine is used to lace two skins together on double-headed drums or just simply to secure the membrane such as the one opposite.

TRIBAL DRUMS

Royal Lunda drum,Royal Lunda ceremony, Zambia, Photo credit PPowell

Mostcommunities in sub Saharan Africa have diverse uses for their drums but thefollowing countries have tribes who have shared an integral historical andspiritual relationship with this revered and sacred musical instrument forcenturies.

(Drum names in brown type) (tribal names in black italics)

Mali: Bara, tama,krin, Bamako

West Africa and Guinea Coast;Djembe (Talkingdrums), Dundun, Dunno, Gome Senegal,Sabar, Bougarabou Gambia, Bougarabou Guinea, Baga Liberia, Dan Cote D’Ivoire, Senufo, Bara

Ghana, Ga, Asante, Ewe,Fanti, Kpanlogo, Gungon, Atumpan, Fontomfro Benin, Yoruba,Ashiko Cameroon, Bamileke

Nigeria; Sakara,Gbedu, Bata, Gudugudu, Chamba, Udu (Talking drums), Doundun,Dunno Igbo, Yoruba, Bambara

Central Africa Angola, Chokwe Democratic Republic of Congo, Kili, Mondo,Bata Kuba, Luba, Yaka

East AfricaRwanda, Udu, Ngoma Uganda, Baganda, Ngoma Tanzania/Mozambique, Makonde

Southern Africa: Ngoma Zambia, Tonga, Budima Zimbabwe, Shona, Shangaan, Tonga South Africa, Venda, Zulu

DRUM DECORATION

Drums can be both musical instruments andsculptures. Images can reference proverbs, cultural traditions and ways ofbehaving, reflect values that are important to communities. They can featureanthropomorphic images like feet, hands, female breasts, human heads as well asfull or squatting figures that carry the drum on their backs. These motifs canbe symbolic, carrying great spiritual meaning or they can just be decorative and tell a story. Femaleimagery is often used to evoke fertility.

Animalsand reptiles lend a wide scope of reference material for zoomorphic reliefcarvings. They play an important role in belief systems and ancestor spirits cantake the form of any animal providing inspiration for the carvers.

Ceremonialdrums will have designs that reflect their status and their historical value; thecareful execution of the carving and consideration for the imagery used fostersboth prestige and belief in the tribal subjects.

TheMongo people of Central Africa use geometric shapes and forms to createvisually stunning drums.

Drumsare treasured assets of any African community; their vibrant and rhythmicsounds stirring up emotions and helping to carry on noble traditions, inspiringnew generations to keep a sense of belonging, discovery and pride.

MODERNAFRICAN DRUMS AND DRUMMING

Abeat is the first thing we hear in life.

No wonder that African drumming hastaken the world by storm.... inciting passion, inspiration, self-expression andhealing in drummers on just about every continent on the planet!

Drums exist in a modern context in Africa in 3 major ways:

·They are still used in the traditional manner for celebrating ceremonial events, rituals and spiritual healing - a rhythmical representation of each happening in the cultural life of a village or community.

· They are often employed as tourist attractions in many African countries, promoting and exhibiting African heritage and culture. They can be part of exciting extravaganzas featuring costumes, music, dance and poetry. They can take any shape and form as long as they emit the required sound! See photo below of drums used in a Shangaan festival in Zimbabwe:

Drums made from tin cans,with interlaced skin membranes,Shangaan, Zimbabwe

· They are also part of social enterprises that uplift and empower local communities. By connecting the traditions to the modern market, the old ways are kept alive and relevant.

Projects like this one raise the profile of the impact drums have on both traditional and modern societies.

Their influence reaches deep into the hearts and homes of all corners of the world.

And then there is music.........