But no more! Our minister bought one of our youth group drummers (who happens to be the minister's son!) a Cajón - a small box shaped instrument originating from Peru.
It's pronounced car (as in what you drive) + HON (to rhyme with on).
It is played by slapping different parts of its side to produce a cut down drum sound - there is a big bassy sound at the bottom, and a snare like sound at the top.
A seriously portable solution to an age old problem - and it suits acoustic style music perfectly by giving some rhythm without overpowering the space.
nice. we use one occasionally as well.
ReplyDeleteany tips for mic'ing them up and eq'ing? We've tried sticking an sm57, but it seems to pick up all the bass, and not much snare sound.
Works well in bigger contexts when miced as well. E.g. at the John Piper event in Brisbane last year (3,500 people) we had a cajon in the band rather than a drummer. Same with the Carson event last week (1,500 people). You really need someone to play it well for it to work though.
ReplyDeleteBoyce Avenue are a YouTube band that make good use of this in there acoustic music.
ReplyDeleteHave been thinking of getting one for my church as we only have a small band.
May I side-track a little on the subject of drums? In our medium-sized church we'll have say 100+ people at the main Sunday service. We have good bands, contemporary music and Drums are a quite appropriate part. However the band is fairly close to the pews and there are frequent complaints that the drums are too loud. Now I grew up with punk and the dinosaurs of rock but sometimes when I'm singing from the pews even I have to agree.
ReplyDeleteSome drummers are moderate but some insist they have to play a certain way to get the best effect. I don't think it's that important, and would like to say "just put a pillow in the base and towels over the snare/toms and you can still whack them with gusto without the sound being overpowering". That's what we did in my garage band at uni, but I'm not a drummer so I'm hesitant to presume to teach grandma to suck eggs.
Is this a reasonable solution and request or is it indeed necessary to play the drums in perfect configuration at the cost of some discomfort to members of the congregation? Does anyone have any better ideas?