Djembe Repair, Tuning & Care
Get Tips To Keep Your
African
Drum In
Shape

Kingy Mensah
Djembe repair
and
maintenance is a
must for every conscious drum owner. Keep your drum in shape and it
will last you many years!
Mensah is a drum builder and percussionist in West Africa. He has been
working with African drums
all
his life and has lots of tips and ticks in store for you.
Fortunately, you don't need to be a professional to properly
take care
of your drum. With the help of Mensah and other drummers you can learn
to do it all yourself. It's fun and relatively easy. Just ask for help
below.
Here are some of the things you need to think of:
Care
A hand-made drum from
West
Africa is a piece of art. What
somebody
crafted with his hands, heart and great effort is
worth receiving
your
best care. Proper handling can prevent a lot of trouble. At the very
least, use a
djembe case
that protects during
transport and storage.
Repair

African drums are hand-made of natural materials and therefore prone to
small imperfections.
It can become necessary to fix small
holes in the hide or to
repair
cracks in the shell. That's easy to do. But you may face
bigger issues as well:
From time to time, you'll need to remove the old rope and
redo the djembe knots
with a new one.
Or you'll even have to replace the whole drum head
because the skin is damaged.
Tuning
When the sound is off, your drumming skills are not necessarily the
problem. Every djembe needs a tune up from time to time. Depending on
the shape of your drum, there are various methods to tune it. You can
have your teacher do it or just learn to tune your djembe yourself.
Need Help? Get Answers To Your Djembe Repair Questions
Something wrong with your drum?
Need to fix it, tune it, replace the head?
Want some tips and tricks before you start working?
We're here to help! Post your question and get answers by me and Mensah or other drummers who've been there and done that: