Djembe

The brilliant drum bellows through the busy park as passersby chat and ponder the wild performance taking place in the center of the public space. As people stop to take a peak, the percussive rhythms ride through their ears and settled down into their souls, beckoning for everyone to bust a move and bounce to the bright, boisterous beats. The origin of the djembe is associated with a class of African Mandinka blacksmiths known as Numu. The wide dispersion of the djembe drums throughout Western Africa may be due to Numu migrations dating from the first millennium A.D. Traditionally crafted djembe drums were carved from a single section of a Lenge tree. Lenge was used for centuries due to its acoustic and spiritual qualities among the Malinke people. Spelling "jembe" with the "dj" comes from the fact that French has no hard "j" sound like that found in English. The "dj" is used to indicate the hard "j" pronunciation. This sound uses the following file from Freesound: http://www.freesound.org/samplesViewSingle.php?id=97739