Phil Maturano here!

Phil. Why the change to Taye? I know all high end drums are gonna pretty much sound great. Just wondering cause I thought you use to play GMS , then Pearl. Do different companies approach you or are you approaching them?

Also, how can I get a copy of your new DVD here in the US? I can't seem to find it anywhere.
 
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Garvin said:
Phil. Why the change to Taye? I know all high end drums are gonna pretty much sound great. Just wondering cause I thought you use to play GMS , then Pearl. Do different companies approach you or are you approaching them?

Also, how can I get a copy of your new DVD here in the US? I can't seem to find it anywhere.

Hi Garvin, you can only get the DVD through me! it's not in stores. I am thinking about a distribution deal but so far with the net, its going fine! If you go to my website just follow the products link and you can buy it there. I ship it to you right away, in a couple of days its at your door!:)

The switch to Taye....its a veeeeeeery long story. Briefly....When I made the move to NY I found that my gear was not able to cut the scene out here, what I wanted was very different. In NY nobody cares if you're famous or have a million endorsements. If no one likes the sound you put out...you don’t get called. it all starts with your gear. There is a definite "sound" in NY. I love that sound. I happen to love those Taye drums and the whole thing came together when I switched cymbal companies. I switched last year to a very very good company called Anatolian, based in Europe. The Anatolian distributor told Ray Ayotte I was changing everything and it snowballed from there. There has to be a mutual benefit between the people involved. When any of those factors don’t line up...the relationship is over. It was time for a new start on many levels so.... that’s how it happened in short form:)
Usually either distributors contact me or the companies directly. Artist rep's or other drummers that are on the roster tell them about you and that’s how those things happen. Well for me anyway:)
pm
 
Phil- A lot of young(and talented no doubt, but misguided) drummers these days seem to memorize as many fancy sounding afro-cuban indepenence excercises as they can, and tons of kids have learned left foot clave for no reason other than"it's hard and impressive. " But none of these kids feel right. Any suggested listening and play-along material as far as getting the time feel and the attitude right? I know that my samba, bossa and mambo feels all need work and I don't have a lot of good records with those rhythms on them. The main album I play along to for this stuff is Cal Tjader's "Monterey Concerts" and it has some amazing bell playing from Willie Bobo, but that's about it. Any other suggestions would be much appreciated.
 
jazzsnob said:
Phil- A lot of young(and talented no doubt, but misguided) drummers these days seem to memorize as many fancy sounding afro-cuban indepenence excercises as they can, and tons of kids have learned left foot clave for no reason other than"it's hard and impressive. " But none of these kids feel right. Any suggested listening and play-along material as far as getting the time feel and the attitude right? I know that my samba, bossa and mambo feels all need work and I don't have a lot of good records with those rhythms on them. The main album I play along to for this stuff is Cal Tjader's "Monterey Concerts" and it has some amazing bell playing from Willie Bobo, but that's about it. Any other suggestions would be much appreciated.
Hi Jazzsnob. Yes you are right. As long as they are messing around with Latin, it’s cool I guess. It’s a huge jump from playing a few patterns and learning a few beats with left foot clave, to actually getting to the point where you’re able to function in the music. Let alone solo over the clave. Part of the problem is that the way people are taught to play this music is generally flawed. There is also the problem that many of the players of this music dont understand the "western" players needs. There are many books and videos that show u patterns. But patterns alone will never get you to where you need to go. To really develop a proper feel and vocabulary especially in Afro-Cuban music, you have to get into the world of African music. The African language, an extremely deep and generally mysterious world is what’s missing in almost every Western drummers vocabulary that I hear. For the Western drummer this is a particularly difficult problem, since there is a great lack of teachers that show you how to do this. Now … I don’t want to turn this into a self promotion, but I have not seen any method that shows Drumset players how to obtain this beautiful feel, other than Efrain Toro’s and my own. Sorry, I hate to say that because it does sound like self-promotion, but it’s true. No amount of independence exercises are going to give you the phrasing necessary to sound authentic and play in clave. Beats and patterns are never ending, and also do not provide the tools to develop the necessary language. I finally realized this myself when certain key people finally took interest in my genuine struggle to learn and hipped me to this fact. I am myself a westernized player so I’m very aware of the struggle.
What I am going to do is post the central theory of my RTS method for you here in the hopes that people might really get a chance to learn the concepts that changed my life in Latin drumming. You can also go to myspace site, or my website and watch a clip from my DVD called RTS- The secret language.
Here is the RTS clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE-24OG83Ms
Also I created a youtube site...http://www.youtube.com/philmaturanodrums where there are lots of clips from my DVD. Hope you enjoy and i hope it was helpful....and thank you for asking.

Another issue is listening to music. The first thing i suggest to everyone is to start listening to BATA music. Also to get every recording by Muñequitos de Matanza. Of course...the problem is, without a method for absorbing this vocabulary...you will be sitting there for years wondering..."what the heck are those guys playing?' hahaha...that happened to me as well so ...You have to know "how to listen" and "what to listen for"

Many warm regards
Phil M.

PS Attached to this post is the RTS theory written out. In PDF form. It is from an article i wrote for Drummer magazine in the UK. You can also find more extensive info on that in my book "latin soloing for the drumset"
 

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Phil,

Great post there and great suggestions. We had Los Muñequitos out here a couple of years back and spawned a folkloric Afro-Cuban group out of that experience. We learned a bunch of Orisha songs and rhythms from John Amira, and had a Djembe Fola from Guinea out here during that whole time, which opened a bunch of doors for our small drum community. All of that exposure to the connection between Ifa religion and Cuba really helped me approach it with a lot of respect. It's taken me a long time to appreciate the music in a secular sense and we always had a hard time straddling that line. A couple of guys didn't want to bring the Bata into bars, so we really kept that more to ourselves.

The biggest thing that came out of that experience for my playing was respecting the boundlessness of the African concept. There is no one for those guys, and everything is completely open within the context of specific rhythms. 4/4 6/8 etc... That just didn't exist to them, it was completely limitless.

Also I worked out of that book "Timbafunk", by Michael Spiro etc... and was wondering if you might give us a brief description in your own words on the Timba concept.

Also, Milton Cardona's album "Cambucha" has some great Bata, Bembe, Orisha stuff in it for anyone who hasn't heard it.

Okay sorry that was a rambler...
 
Garvin said:
Phil,

Great post there and great suggestions. We had Los Muñequitos out here a couple of years back and spawned a folkloric Afro-Cuban group out of that experience. We learned a bunch of Orisha songs and rhythms from John Amira, and had a Djembe Fola from Guinea out here during that whole time, which opened a bunch of doors for our small drum community. All of that exposure to the connection between Ifa religion and Cuba really helped me approach it with a lot of respect. It's taken me a long time to appreciate the music in a secular sense and we always had a hard time straddling that line. A couple of guys didn't want to bring the Bata into bars, so we really kept that more to ourselves.

The biggest thing that came out of that experience for my playing was respecting the boundlessness of the African concept. There is no one for those guys, and everything is completely open within the context of specific rhythms. 4/4 6/8 etc... That just didn't exist to them, it was completely limitless.

Also I worked out of that book "Timbafunk", by Michael Spiro etc... and was wondering if you might give us a brief description in your own words on the Timba concept.

Also, Milton Cardona's album "Cambucha" has some great Bata, Bembe, Orisha stuff in it for anyone who hasn't heard it.

Okay sorry that was a rambler...

Ramble on bro! you sound like you really know what the deal is! Great to hear about your experiences. And thank you for the reference material.

As far as that book you menioned, i am not familiar with it. The whole timba thing is amazing. Its a pity that it didnt really take off in the rest off the world. I guess it was just to regional. Now we are stuck with reggaeton....what a drag! Hahaha....
Many people say that the Buena vista social club movie came and wrecked the whole scene. Because people then thought that was the extent of Afro cuban music. There was no reference at all to more contemporary music styles in that film. Pity.
Mixing funk and Afro cuban music has been around a long time, but timba, that particular style really made it just beautiful! the independence required for timba takes all the afrocuban drumset stuff up another notch!

Can you tell me if all the links are working properly?
Regards
PM
 
Many people say that the Buena vista social club movie came and wrecked the whole scene. Because people then thought that was the extent of Afro cuban music. There was no reference at all to more contemporary music styles in that film.

You know, it's so interesting how that happens in music, particularly world-music and jazz. It's like once someone comes along with something that becomes commercialized to the extent that say the Buena Vista Social Club was, all the sudden that's the bar that the music is set at. It's the same thing with Ali Farka Toure in my mind and the whole Putamayo label in general. I appreciate that they are bringing these contemporary artistis onto people's radar, but there is so much more to it that this one style of music from this one guy in Mali. Mali is a freakin' hotbed of contemporary West African music, but all anyone knows is Ali Farka Toure (may he rest in peace). I guess the hope would be that folks eventually say "where did this sound come from, and who else might be doing something like it?"

But back to Buena Vista. The stuff that they did is certainly important, and it opened people's ears to a sound which was all but completely obscured to American society at large, and for that it was great. But like you say, people are in danger of thinking, "Oh I know all about Afro-Cuban music cause I bought their album". But then what happens when they hear Deep Rumba, or any of the American Clave guys, or even one of Michel Camilo's old albums, or some of your stuff? Their brains will explode!

I think the important thing is for people to realize that musical genre's are artificial things that we create in order to separate all of the stuff that people buy. But there is a commonality between all music and when you open up to everything and realize that music is music and with the right intention, you can combine or evolve in any direction that you want, it becomes beautiful and harmonious as it should be.

I wonder if the evolution of Afro-Cuban music is subject to the same types of restrictions that I see in American Jazz, or Popular music for that matter. To me, it appears to have been a lot more fluid. But maybe that's because I am more of an outsider and haven't taken part in that dialogue as much.

Have you had any debates like this among folks in the scene in NYC?
 
Garvin said:
You know, it's so interesting how that happens in music, particularly world-music and jazz. It's like once someone comes along with something that becomes commercialized to the extent that say the Buena Vista Social Club was, all the sudden that's the bar that the music is set at. It's the same thing with Ali Farka Toure in my mind and the whole Putamayo label in general. I appreciate that they are bringing these contemporary artistis onto people's radar, but there is so much more to it that this one style of music from this one guy in Mali. Mali is a freakin' hotbed of contemporary West African music, but all anyone knows is Ali Farka Toure (may he rest in peace). I guess the hope would be that folks eventually say "where did this sound come from, and who else might be doing something like it?"

But back to Buena Vista. The stuff that they did is certainly important, and it opened people's ears to a sound which was all but completely obscured to American society at large, and for that it was great. But like you say, people are in danger of thinking, "Oh I know all about Afro-Cuban music cause I bought their album". But then what happens when they hear Deep Rumba, or any of the American Clave guys, or even one of Michel Camilo's old albums, or some of your stuff? Their brains will explode!

I think the important thing is for people to realize that musical genre's are artificial things that we create in order to separate all of the stuff that people buy. But there is a commonality between all music and when you open up to everything and realize that music is music and with the right intention, you can combine or evolve in any direction that you want, it becomes beautiful and harmonious as it should be.

I wonder if the evolution of Afro-Cuban music is subject to the same types of restrictions that I see in American Jazz, or Popular music for that matter. To me, it appears to have been a lot more fluid. But maybe that's because I am more of an outsider and haven't taken part in that dialogue as much.

Have you had any debates like this among folks in the scene in NYC?
Hey bro...Sorry for the delay in answering...was out of town and no net access.
Actually I have not had many conversations like that. I wish it was more. I have to agree with your assessment on the evolution of Afro-cuban music. It's much more fluid. maybe the more the Internet takes over the job of music distribution the better off we will all be. This might lead to better evolution of styles In America, not influence by commercial interests. I for 1 can't wait for the day when all labels are extinct and the distribution of music flows freely over the Internet. Controlled solely by the artist.
People need to get used to that concept though and it may take a while. its working on some of level. I probably should take more of an active interest in music production. Drumming itself requires such a huge amount of your time that its difficult to keep an eye on all these other things. At least for me.

By the way it seems that you know a lot African music in that region. can you recommend some more for me? I can never get enough of it.
all the best.
Phil.
 
Hey Phil, nice to hear from you again... I'm on vacation in the Northwest and have been offline for the last few days too.

Anyway, a couple of quick absolutely must have's from West Africa... Any of Habib Koite's albums. Mosu Ko, Maya, and Baro are all I know of. Not to over-sell it, but I can promise that you will listen to these over and over until the day you die, absolutely beautiful and flawless albums in every way. Check em' out, I garauntee 100% satisfaction. Anything you can find by Oumou Sangare is going to be good as well. Rokia Traore is super beautiful and mellow. Brice Wassy is a really intersting artist from Cameroon. Of coure then you have Fela Kuti, Salif Keita, Yossou N'dour, and Baba Maal who are all extremely well established, and I'm sure you've heard of them.

I'm pretty psyched actually because while I'm up here visiting my sister, Fode Bangora (djembe fola from Les Merveilles de Guinea) is having a workshop in town, I'm going to that tomorrow night... He is actually based out of NYC too!



Peace!
 
Wow Garvin, my friend's dad had Habib and his band over for dinner last night and I went and hung out. They're a pretty awesome crew, I must say. The music they put on was pretty amazing. I'm just mad I didn't get to see them play in person, and that I don't speak french. The percussionist only spoke french but when one of his friends said I was a drummer he seemed really and started playing these beautiful polyrhythm things on the tabletop with his hands. I am a white, westernized drumset player, and I was(not surprisingly) awestruck. I know that's kind of a generic story, but it was SWEET. He's playing in SF a few times this week, I'm gonna try and go see him.

Anyway, one thing I must say Phil-I just watched you're entire presentation to the Meinl festival on your youtube thing, and I must say I found it very inspirational. You are a very good clinician and teacher and I'm buying your damn book. :)
 
That's awesome jazzsnob! Don't miss the chance to see him live. It's awesome that they are still touring in the US, I'll have to keep an eye out.
 
jazzsnob said:
Wow Garvin, my friend's dad had Habib and his band over for dinner last night and I went and hung out. They're a pretty awesome crew, I must say. The music they put on was pretty amazing. I'm just mad I didn't get to see them play in person, and that I don't speak french. The percussionist only spoke french but when one of his friends said I was a drummer he seemed really and started playing these beautiful polyrhythm things on the tabletop with his hands. I am a white, westernized drumset player, and I was(not surprisingly) awestruck. I know that's kind of a generic story, but it was SWEET. He's playing in SF a few times this week, I'm gonna try and go see him.

Anyway, one thing I must say Phil-I just watched you're entire presentation to the Meinl festival on your youtube thing, and I must say I found it very inspirational. You are a very good clinician and teacher and I'm buying your damn book. :)

Thank you very much Jazzsnob. If there is one thing that is important to me it's being a good teacher. Being able to communicate information about drumming. If we dont have that with each other, our art suffers. So I really appreciate your words.

If anyone is intersested...i posted some stuff from my next book on my blog
http://www.philmaturano.com/blog/
Left foot clave concepts, audio and pdf files all there for you.
All the best
pm
 
Great Latin clips...the world needs to hear more in my opinion.
Also nice to see another set of Taye drums. Mine are much less expensive but I wanted to try something different and they fit my budget. Thanks for stopping by.
 
Hey Phil welcome to the site!

I actually bought your DVD but it wouldn't play in my recorder so I was able to go to pro-drum shop and excange it for your Latin soloing book....which by the way is a VERY good book...

I definetly want to check you out live so please feel free to let me know when your playing in the L.A. area.....
 
hey phil

i got your dvd. Great work. One thing Iv'e always wanted to understand is what do latin drummers use as fills. Do you guys use a lot of particular rudiments? If you ever come to miami i gotta see you play. Some killer stuff.
 
hi phil

i'm asking all the pros this question. i think the answers could be very instructive to many of us.
let's say there was a totally new drum rudiment that was suddenly discovered and was so totally applicable that any drummer worth their salt would quickly try to learn it, master it and use it in recordings and gigs. this hypothetical new rudiment is quite hard to play and totally unrelated to any other rudiment. it is so good that you know that the next time you sit in on a session the writer is probably going to ask you to use it somewhere in their song.
my question is: starting from scratch what would be your way of learning it?

thanks
j
 
hi phil

sorry to load you up with questions when you get back on the forum but here's another one...

in the August 1992 issue of modern drummer there was a great and useful article titled: THE 25 GREATEST DRUM RECORDS. because of it i bought steely dan's AJA in a time when i was almost exclusively addicted to AC/DC.
they wrote this article by researching across the industry but in particular they asked some of the top guys for their top ten selections. i'm hoping to do a similar thing here on DW and post the reults in a separate thread eventually.
So if you would be so kind please give us a list of your own top ten (perhaps your current top 10) records/albums. it would be helpful if you identified your favourite out of those and dropped in a line why it is so...but this is not totally necessary. think of it like if you were going to be locked in a remote log cabin for a whole winter, which 10 albums would you take, if 10 were all you could take?

thanks
j
 
Hello all, and thank you so much for the emails and kind words. Thanks to Bernhard also for showing up over at HOD and putting his 2 cents on that ugly situation over there. Admirable!

I wish was more time to answer all questions but I am totally swamped, preparing for the new tour, mixing my new CD (due out at FFMM) and trying to keep practicing. Sleep deprived and jet lagged, not a good feeling...but AT THE SAME TIME...A GOOD FEELING! LOL

For those of you who are asking, I will be in the UK and Europe, late March and through the entire month of April. Clinics, gigs and recording. If you would like to arrange for a private lesson just send me an email and i am sure we will find the time! There are many already taking place so I can organize it easily. I have free time in London on the 26th of march, if anyone out there wants to hook up.

As far as 10 top favorite , desert island stuff goes. Man....that is tough, but one thing i could probably not be without for sure is "Fundamento Yoruba - Papo Angarica"
Anything by Muñequitos....
things in that spectrum.

I look forward to meeting cats at the FF Music show and Bernhard...We need a beer together:)
Big hugs
PM
 
I look forward to meeting cats at the FF Music show and Bernhard...We need a beer together:)
Big hugs
PM

We will hopefully meet at Box of tricks - received an invitation.

Is there good beer in Germany? no idea - WE WILL CHECK OUT of course......

Great

Bernhard
 
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