The Complete Handbook of Frame Drums

Chapter 1: Understanding Frame Drums

What a Frame Drum Really Is

A frame drum is the simplest of all membranophones to describe: a membrane stretched over one side of a shallow, usually cylindrical shell. That simplicity is deceptive. The interaction among the shell's depth, the bearing edge's profile, the head's material and tension, and the air column inside the drum produces radically different tones, pitches, and response times. A riq played in a classical Arab ensemble, a bodhran in an Irish pub session, and a large daf in a Persian orchestra are all frame drums, yet a player trained on one cannot simply sit down and play the others without adjusting stroke, grip, and the angle of the drum body. This chapter gives you the foundation for understanding why they differ and how to think about any frame drum you encounter, regardless of tradition or price.

Let us dismiss a common error immediately: a frame drum is not a tambourine, even though they share a basic circular construction. A tambourine almost always has jingles (metal disks or pellet bells) mounted in slots around the rim, and it is commonly played with one hand while the other shakes or strikes it. A frame drum, strictly speaking, is a single-headed drum with a shell depth no greater than its radius, and it may or may not have jingles. The riq is a frame drum with jingles; the bendir typically has a single snare string stretched across the inside of the head; and