How to Play Bongos

Series Summary

A musician is a person who plays or writes music. A musician can be self-taught, or they can learn by formal education in a conservatory or from a private instructor. Musicians have varying levels of activity and ambition in music, which often makes music both a hobby and a profession. The concept and the status of the musician in society varies widely, depending on sociological, cultural and economic factors. In this free video series, a professional saxophonist provides information on playing a variety of instruments, in addition to tips on being a more refined musician. Find out how to play bongos, how to tune a saxophone and how to make money DJing. Learn about kinds of saxophones, reading tablature and the history of scratching records. Become a better musician instantly with help from these free videos.

Video Transcript

"Hey, my name's Brian Medeiros. I'm a musician, and I'm going to tell you a little bit about bongos and how to play them. Bongo drums are used in all kinds of live applications for bands of all different genres. These bongo drums are they're wood and they've got leather stretched over them to make the face of the drum so. Basically to play bongo drums you don't need to be sitting down if it has a strap on it, but it's easier to sit down, put them in your lap. And you can use all different parts of your hand to play them to make different sounds. To use the palm of your hand gets a good percussive sound, and you can also use your fingertips to kind of get a roll like that sound. So basically I'll just demonstrate using different parts of my hand to play the bongo drums. There's really no, the method used to play the bongo drums you just kind of get a feel for it as you play, as you play along. So I'll just demonstrate a little bit of it. That's how you play the bongo drums."