Sabar Drumming

Welcome

This site is devoted to promoting, exploring, and sharing information about Senegalese sabar drumming. Please help make this a comprehensive resource on sabar by providing any information, corrections, or comments you think should be included here.

As one of my Wolof teachers explained: "Sabar drums are special. They are the royal drums of Senegal and are unique to the Senegambia region. Djembes, on the other hand, are played all over West Africa, but the sabar drums are native only to Senegal."

Most all sabar drumming is accompanied by dancing and usually takes place for special occasions and festivals including births, baby naming ceremonies, weddings, holidays and other special celebrations. In addition, sabar drumming is often played for wrestling matches with each wrestler having his own special rhythm. Performance and orchestra style sabar drumming has more recently been made famous by the Senegalese Griot Doudou Ndiaye Rose and his family.

Places to go on this web site:

Doudou Ndiaye Rose on the GorongYeugel.
Photo courtesy of Musiques Traditionnelles en Rhône-Alpes .

LINKS to other GREAT web sites:

  • Village Pulse Outpost - information about sabar and other Senegalese music.

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  • Bob Fulbright's GREAT pages on sabar technique http://www.bongocentral.com/sabartech.htm and tuning http://bongocentral.com/sabartuning.htm

  • Earthshaking Music- great source for African music, instruments, & information.

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  • RhythmWeb - Eric Stuer's great rhythm web page. Everything you ever wanted to know about rhythm and a lot more. Check out the Woodshed page at RhythmWeb, it is full of great study materials on different rhythms.

  • Africassette Music - for those popular Senegalese, background m'ballax tapes, Africa music reviews and a lot more.

  • White Cliffs Media - African and world music source. They also carry Omar Thiam's sabar compact disks.

  • Musiques Traditionnelles en Rhône-Alpes - This site has a great picture of Doudou Ndiaye Rose. In the left frame click on entretiens then scroll down to archives, then click on Doudou Ndiaye Rose. It is in French but scroll down to the bottom for a great shot of this incredible performer.

  • Tamtam Mandingue - This site has info on Mamady Keita's group and schedule, this specific link will take you to Brian Ndiaye Rose, Jr., dancer and son of Doudou Ndiaye Rose.

  • Djabote - More information about Doudou Ndiaye Rose's Djabote from another African music supplier .

  • Index des Artistes - Lots of information about African musicians.

  • Djembe-l FAQ v 17-Links to Other Drum - Great place with lots of links to other drum sites.

  • Parler Le Wolof - This is a great place to pick up a couple of words in Wolof before your trip to Senegal.

  • INA : MultiMedia: Musicographies : Doudou N'Diaye Rose - Go here to listen to an exerpt of Doudou's famous Rose Rhythm.

  • Skydive - Now, if you get tired of drumming try this.

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    Thanks for stopping by!!
    Please send comments to sabar@mindspring.com

    Special Thanks
    to
    Doudou Ndiaye Rose, Wagane Ndiaye Rose, Birame Ndiaye Rose
    El Hadj Ndiaye Rose, and all of the Doudou Ndiaye Rose Family,
    Koto NGum, Tala Faye, Vieux Sing Sing Faye, Mapathé Diop, & Adam Novick
    for your special sabar instruction, support, special memories, and
    most importantly your love of sabar music.

    Page designed and maintained by me-- Karen Hymbaugh sabar@mindspring.com

    Created April 26, 1997 - Last updated March 7, 2001
    The Ay Baati Wolof Dictionary, UCLA Occasional Papers in Linguistics, #9,1991
    by Pamela Munro & Dieynaba Gaye was used for most Wolof spellings.

    Most spellings of drums and rhythms were approved by Wagane Ndiaye Rose.
    Other spellings are provided for reference.

    Disclaimer