Kanga Initialize : Calimbrella Lullabyes  Kangas set piece 02
Channel: inklipMedia / Robert Monk
Date: 2019-03-03

Multi-instrumentalist master instrument-maker Adimu Kuumba launches a newly re-skinned pair of well-worn Gon Bop conga shells and performs the typical magic of introducing a perfected instrument from the past, this time in the form of a pueter (?) umbrella-stand he transformed into a calimba, 50 years ago at the age of 26. I'm calling the goat-headed Gon Bops 'Kangas' to evoke the twang-ringing sound of rim-strikes on the instrument head's circumference - very typical of djembe drums. The unconventional skinning of these shells exhibit a combination of the congas' ballasted-feeling rhythmic attack and the djembe's big, room-filling sound environment that arises from much longer sustains on tone-notes and big, airy bass wafts from a palm strike. The Calimbrella is another order of magic. Pulled from under something in the corner, it required zero tuning after more than a year at rest, and blended a faint hint of metallic ring with the mellowness of common wood box or gourd-chamber calimbas. The 7/8" thick sound/key board on the top features conga ring-lug style tabs pulled to the cylinder of the umbrella stand against a foam gasket. Bottle-cap kashinka-shinks sit under each hand, where the player can mute them at will, during play.