Some funky percussion instruments to spice up your grooves

For over 45 years LP (or Latin Percussion to give them their full title) have been producing a wide variety of traditional percussion instruments for many of the world’s best and most well-known players. Throughout their history they have always been looking for the latest innovations to add to a player’s sound palette. The selection of instruments we have here is no exception. LP’s Qubes, Percusso and Micro Snare being three very innovative products, while the Generation II Pro Bongos are a direct descendant of some of the first instruments the company produced. Ladies and Gentlemen, let’s get percussive …

8” Micro Snare

Also available as a 6” model, the Micro Snare is a mountable mini snare-cum-timbale that mounts onto your kit to add some percussive flavour to your grooves. The shallow steel shell with five mini tube lugs, mounting bracket and pull-twist snare mechanism is simplicity itself, with the single head (with half snare wires underneath) producing a loud and piercing crack with the snares turned on, while turning the snares off gives a very high-pitched and aggressive timbale-type sound. Once mounted on the kit, as a snare this drum is great for funky, poppy and dance-type grooves, giving a very noticeable difference in pitch and attack from a normal-sized snare, and as a timbale it works very well for spicing up funk patterns, or as an excellent additional voice for Latin rhythms and fills. Turning the snares on or off is very straightforward by way of a small T-shaped lever that you pull out and twist, and can easily be done with one hand so as not to interrupt your flow as you play. 

Generation II Professional Bongos

These superb-looking bongos are from LP’s Generation II range, and have solid, kiln-dried Siam oak shells, along with hand-selected rawhide heads and LP’s ‘Comfort Curve II’ rims. All of the gold-plated hardware on the shell has been specifically designed to be as unobtrusive as possible, making these bongos extremely comfortable to play, especially when seated (as opposed to mounting them on a stand), with solid, chunky plates at the bottom of each drum adding strength and durability to these fine instruments, as do internal steel backing plates designed to stop any cracking of the shell, especially for salsa players who often drop their bongos to move on to playing cowbell patterns. Once properly tuned, they produce a very clear and precise sound, with a great degree of warmth and depth accompanying their natural high-pitch tones. Playing open notes at the edge of each drum gives the aforementioned high-pitched tone, but with an added, even higher-pitched overtone, which aided the projection and sustain of the drums immensely. As bongos are concerned, these are pretty loud instruments whatever tones you wish to play. My only negative about these great drums is that nearly £240 they are on the expensive side. This may be prohibitive for some players, which is a shame as they really do sound as good as they look.

Percusso

This has to be one of the coolest percussion instruments I’ve ever seen: not only is it a hand-held tambourine, but also a clave block as well. A large, comfortable rubber handle leads to a lightweight aluminium frame housing 18 sets of jingles. These are removable so that you can customise your sound to suit your taste in jingle-ality (I think that’s a word, if not you read it here in Drummer first). In the centre is a hard, plastic, circular mini jam block, which is struck by a small metal beater when you squeeze the trigger on the front of the handle with your index finger. Although the coordination of playing a smooth tambourine pattern while keeping a clavé pattern running at the same time proved a little tricky at first, after just a few minutes of playing this became fairly simple, leading to much experimentation and fun. The fact that this is done with only one hand, leaving the other to play other instruments, is something that, given a little more time, deserves some further exploration. Another nice feature is you can simply ignore the clave and have a straightforward tambourine or easily remove the jingles, leaving you with a hand-held clave, both of which sound great alone or combined. 

Qube Shakers

I have to admit that when I first saw these two cube-shaped shakers my first impression was that these were a touch ‘gimmicky’, but boy how wrong I was! Available in two different sizes, with the larger of the two having a distinctive chequerboard design, while the smaller has dotted sides the same as a dice (with the dots being replaced by LP’s round logo – a very nice touch), the wooden Qubes add a new dimension to what a shaker usually has to offer, in that not only can you play them in a traditional way, i.e. with a back-and-forth movement, but by twisting your wrist as you play you can conjure up some very interesting patterns (you can see a demonstration of this on LP’s website www.lpmusic.com). The larger of the two shakers is lower in pitch than the smaller, and is slightly louder, but both sound very good indeed, and with a small amount of practice could easily be used to add some interesting rhythmic variations to patterns produced using traditional-shaped shakers. They’re a convenient size too - you can carry them home in your pocket!

Conclusion

All of these products bar the Generation II Bongos are quite unique in their design and offer some interesting sounds to add to your arsenal. The Qubes, although quite a novelty at first, are a very capable alternative to traditional shakers, while the Micro Snare would make a great addition to any drummer’s kit. The Percusso is a very innovative instrument indeed, and with a little practice makes playing some great percussive grooves a breeze – with only one hand! The Generation II Pro Bongos are expertly made, look fantastic and sound mightily impressive. Although a little pricey, for anyone serious about percussion they should be tried. All in all, some great products from a well-known and respected provider of all things percussive.