Models

Nazareth Berimbau

A musical bow with a gourd resonator

Hand percussion · Brazil

The berimbau is a wooden bow, a steel string, and a gourd pressed against the player's stomach to open and close the resonance. It leads capoeira: the roda's tempo, and which game is played, are called by the berimbau.

Contemporânea Surdo

The bass drum of the samba bateria

Hand percussion · Brazil

The surdo carries the pulse of a samba school, and Contemporânea builds them in aluminium and wood across the three tuned sizes a bateria uses — first, second, and third surdo.

Gope Pandeiro

Brazil's most widely exported pandeiro

Hand percussion · Brazil

Gope's pandeiros are the ones most often seen outside Brazil, in both nylon and natural-skin heads, and in the aluminium frames that survive travel.

Nazareth Atabaque

The tall hand drum of candomblé and capoeira

Hand percussion · Brazil

Rope-tuned with wedges driven down the sides, the atabaque comes in three tuned sizes — rum, rumpi, and lê — played together in Afro-Brazilian religious music.

Contemporânea Pandeiro

The Brazilian frame drum

Hand percussion · Brazil

The pandeiro's jingles are cupped and dry rather than bright, and the head is tunable, which lets one player produce bass, slap, and jingle parts simultaneously.

Contemporânea Repinique

The bateria's calling drum

Hand percussion · Brazil

The repinique is the drum the leader plays to call a samba school in and out of sections, high-pitched and played with one hand and one stick.

Contemporânea Tamborim

A tiny frame drum played with a multi-rod beater

Hand percussion · Brazil

The tamborim is six inches across, held in one hand, and struck with a flexible multi-rod stick; the virada figures it plays are the most recognisable sound in the bateria.

Gope Atabaque

The tall hand drum of candomblé and capoeira

Hand percussion · Brazil

The atabaque is a tall, rope- or key-tuned hand drum used in Afro-Brazilian religious music and in capoeira rodas, built by Gope in the three traditional sizes.