Ernesto's Bongos ( before the LP Dandy, I had the same idea

[Ernesto Pediangco]

The 9" inch hembra is not the standard size. Back in the day the normal hembra was 8". Rogelio "Yeyito" Iglesias (in my opinion the greatest bongocero in Cuban music) was very avant garde and started using a 9" hembra, also is responsible for the 10 lug bongo. Willie Bobo, when he was TP's bongocero and Mongo was the tumbador asked Mongo to bring him back from Cuba a 9" hembra Vergara, that's how this 7" & 9" Vergara came about. Willie Bobo returned this Vergara to Mongo before he died in 1983. Photo of Yeyito Iglesias on bongo enclosed.

Dario

Cachao Y Su Descarga.jpg

Yes I remember this album cover & the descargas. I remember both Gon Bops & Valjes made a larger Hembra set as well. I never cared for them, mostly because Gon Bop's thin shells cracked from stress where the separator block was bolted to thinest part of the shell & Valje's always had the worse design from the 2 independent shell separators that allowed twisting which made the joining bolts twist in the wood. The tuning systems were to light to fight & too thin to win ! In both cases, the hard wares had insuficient clearances & things bent out of alignment and caused damage to hooks or worse. Copying those models w/o correcting these issues is building obsolete problematic designs. These designes are the cause for the most reports of broken bongos that I am aware of or of drums I have repaired. Perhaps in the old days of more natural acoustics & balance being practiced by musicians, a 9" hembra made a difference, but these days w/ heavier bongos & louder bands, It seem practical to use standard comfortable between the legs models w/ better heads than what Asia provides & to insist that the percusionist & rhythm section use balance & sound re inforcement to blend the overall sound. Larger is not always better. But it makes sense if you have big hands, to have bigger playing surface on bongos. My smaller JCR's and a smaller set of Meinls were crisper & could use thinner heads that projected as if like they might have been plastic but sounded as great as natural heads do. They fitted my medium sized hands & were comfortable not to wide between the legs. When Lp made a 3 bongo set w/ a tiny bongo, It was STUPID ! The larger 9" added to a regular set made more sense. Just because it says Lp does not make it better. Its just a mass produced consumer product that takes decades or more to fix obvious design flaws.

[Ernesto Pediangco]

ive visited Lima Peru twice, and its very hard to find a decent set of bongos, since peruvians arent very good @ making them, they are better artisans of cajons...the same goes for Ecuador, i bought a pair in Guayaquil that were pretty lame with real weak hardware...the only south american countries i would trust is Colombia & Venezuela, maybe Brazil...and they'd have to be by a respectable artisan/maker......my 2cents...

I agree the economy & demand for US market percussion is not developed in Peru. I was lucky to have found copies of Lp tapered shell design & almost same head sizes. I discarded the aluminun base & crowns. I traded the Lp Valje crown rims & sold the Siam Oak Lp Valjes mediocre junk since the shells were cracking & out of round ( I fixed before selling ) Pasqual Basilio makes some nice congas & Bata ( have not seen his bongos ) but not as refined as custom build from better industrial economic countries. Its all market driven. The Bongos I got were name less but had thicker medium density wood, perfect sound edges & a Macho that was slightly smaller than Lp head sizes but Lp Valje crown worked beautifuly ! It has what is called a " floating shell " where the head is not so close to the out side shell, and in this case is very good to asist easy travel of the cuero / drum head on a rounded contoured sound edge.The HR bongos I had were very heavy even with the aluminum base / which cracked & the shells cracked at the seams. Thjet did have 180 degree rounded edges & came w/ to thick of heads. Lp's top of line bongos , copied the thin sharp edges from early Valjes, and is common to snare drums that use plastic heads & drum sticks, NOT good for skins & HAND drumming. Theres as much junk drums in Latin America as there is any where else. Asian made products have been selling junk too, but they are shinny & pretty & marketed for the U.S & European markets. Even Cuban drums are mediocre in design & workmanship because of the level of industrial obsolesence from Nationalized companies. The shop workers are limeted by these realities & from old styled designs from the 50's. The patched up old cars get better attention than fabrication of crude drum instruments. Personaly, I think it's sad that Asian companies build drums from another cultural heritage to the point that Latin America or North America can not compete in the market. ( my 2 Sols & 2 centavos & I raise you 2 Yen !

[b0ng0]

ernesto, haha i'll raise u another 2 soles...
1 thing i must confess about the great ppl in Peru, they love their salsa, especially in "callao", thats where most of the salsotecas are, that city even constructed a statue of Hector Lavoe as a tribute soon after he passed away..