MAKING DUB WITH COMPUTERS - CHAPTER 7: THE NYABINGHI RHYTHM

In this chapter I would like to elaborate a little on a special rhythm, much used in reggae, especially Rastafarian Reggae: The Nyabingi Rhythm. The name for the rhythm comes from African Congolese language and in the Rastafarian tradition it means: "Death to Black and White Downpressors". The rhythm serves as music for many Rastafarian chants. Although the rhythm is used in reggae, it is not a reggae rhythm in the strict sense of the word: there are even some Rastafarians, shunning almost every technology and so on, who claim that Rasta's can't make reggae and should stick to Nyabinghi. 

There's a lot to say about Nyabinghi, and on this page you can find a link to a site that makes special Nyabinghi drums and give some back ground information about it. In this section I will stick to the musical aspect of it, and I would like to explain some of the basic aspects of it.

But First, I would like to ask you to listen to the following audioclip from an original Nyabinghi session. 

LISTEN: EXAMPLE0009.MP3 (336 Kb)

As you can hear, the Nyabinghi rhythm is not a drum rhythm, played by a drum-set. Although it is used in Nyabinghi tracks, basically it's a rhythm played by three different drums, a Bass Drum, a Repeater or Kete Drum, and the Funde Drums. The foundation for the Nya rhythm is the bass drum. It plays a straight heart-beat rhythm, which, when you would have to program it in a sequencer, could look like this:

While this bass drum plays the heart beat, the other drums play over it. The accents of the rhythm are on the 1st and 3rd count. But it is also possible to "halve" this, by putting the accent on the first two counts of a measure. So on the one and the two. That will make the rhythm much slower as you will see in the next chapter.. Below is an audioclip of a Nyabinghi inspired rhythm I have played on a handmade conga. It served as introduction for a track called Jah Glory (SPEED: 150.16 bpm). 

LISTEN: EXAMPLE0010.MP3 (329 Kb)

It's very difficult, IF NOT IMPOSSIBLE, to program the Nyabinghy Rhythm. It is based on the playing of the three drums. It's better to record play with a conga then to program it. But I will, in the next chapter, show you an example of a general midi programmed Nyabinghi style rhythm

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