Drum investigations

Both use mylar heads, and the bodies are constructed of aluminium. Weight is good. Sound is good.

The Egyptian design is something that could work for a mrdanga. It would remove the perishable rubber component from the current Balarama design.

A young guy at the drum shop told me he bought a clay darbuka in Egypt that uses mylar heads. I'm going up the coast to the place that imports darbukas to see some clay ones. I'm interested in the possibility of a hybrid clay / synthetic head design.

We have a locally made clay water filter at Atma, so we can get fired clay. Glazed it will be stronger than the unglazed bodies made in India.

Remo make Nuskyn and Fibreskyn heads for world percussion instruments. These are synthetic heads that mimic animal skins, using layers of Mylar and Tyvek.

It's almost impossible to get animal drum heads into Australia. Customs gamma rays and sprays them, which makes most of them break quite soon afterwards. There are local animal skin suppliers, but these are definitely not ahimsa heads.

Synthetic heads avoid the animal slaughter angle, and are easier to replace and more consistent in different weather conditions.

The current Balarama design uses a 17.5" head. The darbukas have 22" heads. The Remo Djembe has a 30" head. We'll make our mrdanga use a standard Remo head, so that replacements are easily procurable.