Ntunpam Drummer

The drum or tam-tam is undoubtedly the most widely used musical instrument in Africa. It is used as an instrument of music, indispensable companion in ceremonies, rites, dances and other ceremonial uses and accompaniment of masks, it serves to communicate information, to transmit messages up to distances of several kilometers, to call the warriors to war or hunting and to announce a victory, to announce and animate parties or ceremonies or to warn of the arrival of the king or visitors to the village, the death of a person or any other important event. Not forgetting their active participation in the necrological, magical and religious manifestations and accompanying the shouts while telling stories, myths and legends or reciting genealogies. The drum is therefore closely linked to the word whose rhythms, tones and sounds it tries to transmit. Like tonal languages, meaning that a word or syllable according to the tone or the place in which it is pronounced will acquire a different meaning, so the sound of the drums according to their tone, intensity, duration or sequence will constitute a coded sound language that makes it a true means of communication when translating sounds into words. The drums, especially those of ceremony, allow the sculptor to express all his artistic talent. It represents one of the most important manifestations of African art. And the drum of ceremony, in addition to its original use, acquires a sacred meaning by serving as a medium or support for powerful rites intended to communicate with the spirit world.

Communication by means of drums is done by means of fully encoded signs known some of them by the people of the village, but others only by those initiated. Their sones constitute a true language and are the replica of the word, since the word can be transmitted with its tones, rhythms and sounds through the tam tam. To the late professor Georges Niangorán Bouah, an eminent Ivorian ethnologist, we owe the most profound study that has been carried out in the decoding of the sound language of the drum, a pioneering and profound study that has been elevated to science under the name of “drummology” or science of the language of the drums.

The term membranophones is applied to drums whose resonance box is covered by extended skin. They are made from a tree trunk whose interior is emptied and whose exterior is sculpted in the desired way according to the aesthetic sensation that you want to achieve.

This double amborant that that bomorilero is playing is the known drum in the band Akan like "ntunpam" or talking drum, is the charged to transmit lps messages. Weird piece, old patina.