page_title: Dabakan
section_title: Uses
hierarchical_section_title: Dabakan / Uses
caption_attribution_description: English: The dabakan is a Philippine, single-headed, drum made of jackfruit/coconut lumber topped with a lizard or goat skin drumhead. It’s the only non-drum instrument of the kulintang ensemble. In this image, a Magui Master Artist playing the dabakan during a kulintang performance. Deutsch: Ein dabakan ist eine trommel auf den Philippinen, deren Geräuscherzeugung durch das Schwingen einer membran erfolgt. Sie besteht aus einem kelchförmigen Körper, der traditionell aus Kokosnusspalme ist und mit Haut von Rind und Schlangenleder bespannt ist.
context_page_description: The dabakan is a single-headed Philippine drum, primarily used as a supportive instrument in the kulintang ensemble. Among the five main kulintang instruments, it is the only non-gong element of the Maguindanao ensemble.
context_section_description: The main use for the dabakan in Maguindanao and Maranao society is as a supportive instrument in the kulintang ensemble, keeping the tempo of the ensemble in check like the babendil. On most rhythmic modes, such as sinulog and duyog, the dabakan enters after babandil but in tidto, where the babendil is absent, the dabakan always starts the piece. The Maguindanao and the Maranao usually position the dabakan to the right of the kulintang player, near the end of its frame, during a traditional performance.
  The dabakan could be used in other types of playing other than the ensemble. The dabakan could be used as the accompaniment for the kutiyapi, a type of Philippine boat-lute. The dabakan plays a major role in a type of playing known as Kasorondayong. In the Maranao version, which is in recognition of their prince hero, Prince Bantogen, two dbakan players face one another, standing behind their dabakans, striking them with two slender bamboo sticks while playing an interlocking rhythm.
  Traditionally, the dabakan is considered a masculine instrument by the Maranao and a feminine instrument by the Maguindanao but as a sign of the times, one could see both men and women handling the dabakan. In wooden kulintang ensembles, the takemba, a bamboo zither of the Manobo, is usually substituted  for the dabakan part.
  During older times, the bigger, longer double-headed dabakan, known as a dadabooan, would be hung horizontally in the mosque (See Kendang, for smaller version of this drum). An imam (spiritual leader) would hit the drum repeatedly announcing the beginning of prayer time throughout the outerlying areas. As a sign of the times, the dabakan in Mindanao have now been replaced by more modern equipment such as a speakerphone but the practice still continues in places like Sulawesi, where a mesigit, equivalent to the dabakan, would be used for the same purpose.
caption: Playing the dabakan as part of the kulintang ensemble
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