Latin Drumming Guide: 5 Essential Latin Drum Beats

Latin drumming is a percussion style that transcends many forms of Latin American music, including salsa, son Cubano, samba, bossa nova, cascara, calypso, merengue, bolero, mambo, cha-cha-cha, tango, songo, and folkloric musical styles such as rumba and cumbia.

The specifics of Latin drumming vary by style of music, but it typically includes a large drum section with a mixture of drums, idiophones, and hand percussion. Latin drumming also involves frequent use of clave patterns (bell patterns) on one or more percussion instrument.

A great number of Latin percussion instruments have their roots in Africa and reached the western hemisphere via Cuba. Thus, Afro-Cuban rhythms and Afro-Cuban music tend to be at the core of most Latin rhythms and drum beats. Some famous Latin percussion instruments include:

1. 1. Congas: Congas are tall, deeply-pitched drums that stand on the floor or on study chrome hardware. The drummer plays them by hand, often emphasizing a bass melody called the tumbao.
2. 2. Bongos: Bongos are a type of hand drum and may prominently feature in hand drum solos. They come in different sizes, but they are smaller than conga drums. A bongo drum produces a higher pitch than a conga.
3. 3. Timbales: Timbales are small, metal-frame drums that are mounted on a stand and played with beaters. A timbale player usually has two drums, plus cowbell and perhaps a woodblock, as part of their kit.
4. 4. Cajon: Originating in Peru, the cajon is a hollow wooden box that usually features internal snares on one side. The player sits on the cajon and strikes it with their hands (and occasionally beaters).
5. 5. Steel drum: Not technically a drum but still played with beaters, the steel drum (or steel pan) is idiomatic to calypso music. Drummers can attain different pitches by striking different parts of the concave metal drum.
6. 6. Five-piece drum kit: Latin music ensembles also frequently use standard drum kits. A five-piece drum kit consists of bass drum (also called a kick drum), snare drum, floor tom, rack tom-toms, hi-hat cymbal, ride cymbal, crash cymbal, and an optional splash cymbal or China cymbal.
7. 7. Claves: Claves are wooden sticks that click together to produce an unpitched sound. They are a mainstay of salsa music.
8. 8. Agogo: The agogo is an unpitched metal bell (or pair of bells) often featured in samba music.
9. 9. Ganzá: The ganzá is an unpitched metal rattle developed in Brazil and popular in Brazilian samba.
10. 10. Tambourine: Tracing back to the Middle East, the tambourine can be part of a drum set, or it can be handheld. A tambourine can have a drum head or it can exclusively produce sound via its zils (or jingles), which are metal discs mounted around the tambourine frame. Some players opt for a pandeiro, which is a close relative of the traditional tambourine.
11. 11. Maracas: Maracas are wooden shakers with handles. They originated in Venezuela and are popular throughout Latin American music.
12. 12. Castanets: Castanets are handheld wood idiophones that come in pairs. They make a clicking sound when the player snaps two of them together.
13. 13. Güiro: The güiro is an idiophone made from a dried gourd and typically played by rubbing wire brushes against it.
14. 14. Shekere: The shekere is a dried gourd covered with a netting of beads. Originally from West Africa and also popular in Latin American traditions, it produces sound when shaken.
15. 15. Cabasa: The cabasa is a type of African shaker made by wrapping metal chains around a wooden cylinder.
16. 16. Cowbell: The cowbell is a hollow metal idiophone named for a similar device hung around the necks of some domestic cows.

The foundation of Latin American drum patterns is the clave—a repeating musical phrase played by one or more percussion instruments. Claves are particularly linked to the music of Caribbean islands, although South American countries like Venezuela and Brazil have their own variants on the clave.

1. Son clave: The most widespread form of clave is called son clave, which comes from the tradition of son Cubano. Both the 3:2 son clave pattern or the 2:3 son clave pattern are West African in origin and were brought to the new world by African slaves. Son clave is popular in the Latin jazz that sprang out of New York City, including Dizzy Gillespie's "A Night in Tunisia" and Cal Tjader's “Ritmo Uni.” An example of a 3:2 son clave is as follows:

2. Rumba clave: A very close variation on son clave is rumba clave. It displaces one beat by an eighth note but is otherwise the same pattern. It is common in salsa, bossa nova, samba, and Afro-Cuban jazz music. An example of a 3:2 rumba clave is as follows:

3. Cascara: The cascara pattern also appears in a repeating two-bar form. Like the clave, it can appear in a 3:2 pattern or a 2:3 pattern. It can also layer on top of a clave to create a multi-faceted groove. An example of a 3:2 cascara rhythm is as follows:

4. Salsa groove: You can combine the clave and cascara patterns to create a groove that might anchor a salsa drum groove. An example of a 3:2 salsa groove is as follows:

5. Samba groove: While clave patterns do appear in Brazilian samba and bossa nova, some Brazilian musicians keep their grooves distinct from a Cuban-style clave pattern. Here is a samba groove that establishes its own bell pattern, without drawing from son Cubano.

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