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I've noticed on Youtube a couple fine congueros and Tomas Cruz's in parts of his instruction DVD's playing a quinto and tumba pair without a conga. What little I've heard sounds good; however, I've never really seen anything written about this other than "preference". So I wonder what shaped this preference? What are these players listening for? Are there setup guidelines for the practice? Are there genres that this works with better than with others? Is it practical for one wanting to play gigs? How common is it period? What do you think about this pairing?

Personally I stick to Conga/Tumba.

The conga fits relatively big hands more comfortably and can always be cranked up to near enough Quinto if you so wish.

I do have a couple of Quintos in my garage but can't remember when I last wheeled one out. Then again I prefer to hold a solid groove, play in the pocket as they say.

Thanks Derbeno. Oddly it's some of your vid postings on youtube I was thinking about. Yesterday a buddy of mine, also a fairly new conga player like me, and I were admiring a solo by Adonis Panter on youtube that was with a quinto and 2 tumbas. My hands are average size so I don't know if it would make a difference. Though really I'm not contemplating using this set up because I have lots of room to grow and to maximize the enjoyment I have with my 2 drums before I consider investing in another drum. I also don't fully grasp the reasons why people make this pairing choice when as you write it's not hard to crank up a conga. I was hoping for some insight in the practice because I do see some fine congueros making this choice. What guides their thinking and preferences? It's been a question of curiosity for me for many months because well I'm curious about alot of conga stuff but the answer to this question does not seem ready. Peace!

That video of adonis is awesoome! I love the sound of those old cuban drums!

As far as the pairong of Quinto and Tumba I think it has a lot to do with the Timba and Songo Marcha that cubans play, if you listen to the rides, particularly on some Van Van stuff where it's fairly siml,e you will notice the 'riffing " on the quinto has a lot of slaps and is very different from your typical son montuno "tumbao" and marcha.
PC

hi nobleway,
The usual set up in a latin band situation like salsa/timba would be a conga and a tumba and maybe a third drum conga or tumba tuned between the those two.

As for using only a quinto and a tumba, it doesn't make a lot of sense - but that would depend on the tuning more than anything (if you had nothing else then you might get by with it).

Quinto is a pretty small drum and is designed to be pitched high - in Cuba it's usually used for riffing in rhythms like Rumba Guaguanco or Rumba Columbia. It might work in a funk band or some other music situation. Watch out for the Conga Police tho - they might issue you with a citation!

ciao
pavlo

In 99% of situations I've seen using 3 drums - it's quinto/conga/tumba.

Look at all the videos of the pros.
They are almost exclusively using the quinto/conga/tumba config with the quinto as the main/center drum.
It's all about personal preference, I'm just giving an opinion based on what I see.
Whether it's the LP videos or all of the Remo videos almost exclusively a quinto/conga/tumba are used.
The modern quinto is designed larger and has become as versatile as the conga.

The thing that matters most is the tuning.
So quinto/tumba would not be the best pairing but it works with proper tuning.