congaplace.com

hey hi, I just got a conga set for my birthday and I'm just getting started learning the fundamentals.

I have a 2 drum set, I believe it's a conga and a quinto.. A lot of rhythms I see played on the conga seem to use either 3 drums or a conga and a tumbadora. So I'm wondering what are some rhythms that would be useful to learn that I can play on a conga + quinto?

I've learned the basic tumbao and guaguanco using the conga for the low drum part, is that stupid? should I trade my set and get a tumbao? I don't really want to spend a lot of time or money doing things that don't involve playing since I'm a hobbiest and just want to play a few hours a day.

Also, how should I tune this set? I've read that usually a conga is tuned to C and quinto to E, but if I'm playing rhythms normally played on conga and tumba, should I maybe tune them to G + C which I understand as the tuning for tumba + conga? ...or do my questions reveal that I am hopelessly misguided and should leave the playing to the pros...?

again, my main interesting at this point is learning, so I just want to develop some good playing habits and not have to unlearn something later.

any pointers on getting started would be greatly appreciated.


thanks

I'll leave most of the answers to your questions to the other members, but here is a good start for you: http://youtube.com/view_play_list?p=2E3F2B70379C5868
This is a series of beginner instructional videos made by Johnny Conga, a very talented professional conguero who frequents this forum. This will help you immensely.

brilliant for sure. I've already watched a bunch of his videos but didn't make the connection that it was johnny conga in those videos. thanks, cheers.

You have been taken in the right direction with the videos from Johnny Conga.